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THE 

Truth About the War 



J. Ti^BURNO, 

ST. PETERSBURG. 



TRANSLATED BY 

VICTORIA VON KREUTER. 



PUBLISHED BY 

FRANKLIN HUDSON PUBLISHING CO., 

KANSAS CITY, MO,, U. S. A. 



lUBBARY of .'^0S^fi3j?ESSJ 


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rtag«wda 


OCT § 


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Copyright, 1905, bt 

FRANKLIN HUDSON PUBLISHING CO. 

Kansas Citt, Mo., U. S. A. 



CONTENTS. 



Preface 5 

On the Road to Mukden 7 

In the Army 9 

The Operations at Sandepoo H 

The Departure of General Grippenberg- 16 

Proposed Second Attack of Sandepoo 20 

Diary of Events Near Mukden 25 

The Panic in the Train 45 

The Change of Commander-in-chief , 55 

Operations on the Left Flank and in the Center 57 

Short Synopsis of the Operations at Mukden 62 

The Intendancy g7 

The Sanitary Service 71 

The Railway and the Evacuation of Mukden 79 

The Military Censorship gg 

The Rear of the Army 94 

The Cause of Our Failures 9g 

The Firing jL19 

The Consequences of the Surrender of Port Arthur 123 

The Carrying of the Wounded from the Field of Battle 125 

The Russian Soldier j27 

Table of Russian Weights and Measures I35 

Index 1 o*7 



TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE, 



Mr. J. Tabumo, a civil engineer by profession and a special 
correspondent of the Novoe Vremia^ went abont the middle of 
December, 1904, to tlie theater of militar\^ operations, for the 
purpose, as stated in the brief preface of his work, of '^TDeeom- 
ing acquainted witli the true condition of our troops in Man- 
churia^, and presenting it in its true light /^ In April, 1905, he 
placed before the public the results of his observations in a book 
entitled ^'The Truth About the War," which^ in addition to great 
literary merit, is invaluable as an accurate, unprejudiced, impar- 
tial account of the operatioins near Mukden, as a sincere and' con- 
scientious research into the cause of Russian failure, giving a clear 
insight into the true condition of affairs. 

In the RiLSshi Invalid of June 25th, General Parensoff, of 
the Eussian General Staff, highly commends Mr. Taburno's book^ 
his opinion being shared by "F. M.," likewise a general of the 
General Staff, editor of the Eusshi Invalid, and concludes with 
the words, "This isi a remarkable, an excellent book." 

His other works, ^TReview of the Financial and EconomjiGal 
'Condition of Russia for the Last Twenty Years,-'' a thorough and 
conscientious research in the domain of political economy, "The 
Reminiscences of an Insurgent," treating on the Revolution of 
Poland, and other stories, are likewise of great merit. 

Mr. Taburno is not an advocate of peace and gives good rea- 
sons why it should not be concluded.. He says that it is neces- 



sary to make the Eussian soldiers iiniderstand that victory is indis- 
pensable and victory will crown their arms. 

He little knew, when publishing his book in April, that a 
month later the grant of equal rights to the subjects of all natioia- 
alities and religions composing the population of Russia, as advo^ 
cated by him at the close of his book, would be an accomplished 
fact, thus once more demonstrating that war, this so-called scourget 
of nations, is an evil which, as shown by the entire history !of the 
world, brings blessings in its wake; the blessings brought by this 
bloody and disastrous war to Kussia being incalculable. 

It is through the courtesy of American military authorities 
that I had the privilege of reading the book of Mr. Taburno, of 
having the possibility of translating and publishing it, and I beg 
them to accept my most sincere thanks for the aid tendered me. 

1 beg liJvewise the American Army to accept this humble trans- 
lation of a remarkable work, while craving indulgence for the 
imperfections of this translation, as an homage to ^^the honorable 
calling of the soldier,'^ for which I have all admiration and all 
esteem. 

Victoria von" Kreuter. 



PREFACE. 



So many confiicting rumors reached us during the last 
months of the past 5'ear, from the theater of military operations, 
on the condition of our Army, that it was very difficult to see 
clearly into them, and still more so to (lud out anything on the 
true state of affairs. In the middle of December of last year I 
started for the seat of ^Yar, for the purpose of becoming acquaint- 
ed with the true position of our troops in Manchuria an'd present- 
ing everything in its true light. The development of events 
forced me to remain there much longer than I expected, and 
to witness many gladdening and positive facts, but, alas ! a great 
many more negative onesy at the remembra,n(ce of which the heart 
grows heavy. My moral duty is to lay before the Russian pub- 
He all I have observed and seen. Tt well might be that, as a civ- 
ilian, a non-specialist in military matters, I have made mistakes 
in some of my deductions; but I can say one thing: the facts 
shall be given such as tliey are, such as I found them. I crave 
forgiveness in advance that my narrative will not always keep 
strictly to the chronological order of events. 

It may be that the data given by me will not be deemed 
sufficient, but this is because many of them cannot be communi- 
cated asi yet, as they might be of use to the Japanese. 



It 



MAP OF VICINITY OF 

MUKDEN 



Where took place the operations during the 211 half 

of February, 1905 (Ap "Truth About the War.') 

J. TABURNO 




The truth about the war. 



Chapteh 1. 



ON THE EGAD TO MUKDEN. 

I met along. the whole road from, Samara to Kharbin eche- 
lons of troops and military supplies sent toi the theater of war. I 
cannot say that what 1 saw and heard made a favorable impres- 
sion on mo. The tales of disorders^ caused on the one or the 
•other of tlie stations on that long road by detachments of troops, 
testified to tlie lack of discipline and the defective organization 
of the transportation of military echelons. The troops sent in 
entire nnits (by coinpanies, batteries, squadrons) proceeded in 
order. Such was not the case with the echelons sent to complete 
detachments already at the seat of war. They created disorders, 
got drunk, refused to obey their chiefs, etc. In my opinion, this 
ought not to be wondered at. The men forming these echelons 
"were taken straight from the plough, uniformed, and sent off un- 
der command of reserve ofiicers, often only second lieutenants, who 
lost their heads at the first complication. 

The further I proceeded, the more vivid grew before me 
the picture of the imperfection of the measures adopted. The 
dark coloring to this picture was added by the defective traffic 
'and movement of trains, on account of which the echelons were 
always late in arriving at the etape stations. Eot example, the 
dinner for a certain unit is prepared for 11 a. m., but, on accounij 
of the lateness of the arrival of the train, it is served to the men 
at 10 p. m., or sometimes still later. What kind of ai dinner could 
it be, and what could be the condition of the food at that time? 



8 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

This circumstance had no little effect on the temper of the sol- 
diers. It is difficult for me to understand why the troops could 
not proceed with our excellent field kitchens (on my way back 
I saw that some units had those kitchens in the cars and cooked 
their meals on them)^ the necessary number of which ought to 
have been prepared for the troops sent for the filling up of the 
'ranks of the units — L e., those that traveled without their house- 
keeping personnel. 

The culminating point of disorderly trafhc was to be found 
on the Trans-Bail^al Eailway line (at the present time it is far' 
better). I sent a telegram to the Novoc Vremia from the Man- 
churia station with regard to this condition of afl'airs, but it was 
unrecognizable when it reached the readers. 

I was afterwards told that it was impossible to give infor- 
mation as to our movements of troops^ because news with regard 
to our means of transportation of troops might reach the enemy, 
it seems to me, however^ that it is rather naive to suppose that 
"AV'hat anyone could see, not excluding foreigners (there were two 
Americans proceeding to some gold mines on the train in which 
1 traveled), would be unknown to the enemy once it was of inter- 
est to him. This is everybody's secret. 

Kharbin, the principal point in the rear of the Manchurian 
Army and the center of railway and local administration, makes 
'.a. vivid impression testifying to the successful colonizing capa- 
bilities of the Eussians. Some six or seven years ago this local- 
ity was a desert. At present it is a flourishing city, the center 
cf commerce, with wide commercial relations, steamer traffic, 
and a seething commercial life. However gladdening it is to 
notice here the power of the Iiiissians, an entirely different im- 
pression is made by Kharbin as the rear of our Army. But this 
shall be discussed later. 



="'A Station on the Trans-Baikal Railway. 



Chapter II. 

m THE AEMY. 

Upon my arrival at Mukden, and the necessary permit hav- 
ing been obtained, I started to inspect the disposition of our 
armies. To be just, it must be admitted that excellent care was 
taken of the soldier., It is not probahle that in any other war 
such attention had been given to the soldier's life: he ^vas pro- 
vided with warm clothing, good footwear, warm quarters, plenti- 
ful and excellent food. It seems to me that the soldiers have 
never fared so w^ell in time of peace as in the present war : every- 
where and always did they have hot food, eyen in battle. The 
Eussian field kitchen is priceless in time of war. The sanitary 
condition of the x\rmy is such that nothing better could be 
desired. The number of sick iat very small.. 

In regard to the esprii and the morale oi the Army, I must 
say that, although cheerfulness could not be denied the troops, 
they were not at the height necessary to insure a glorious vic- 
tory. Quite a large number of oIFicers, of the higher as well as 
'of the lower ranks, not counting the civilian employees and sur- 
geons, the number of which is quite considerable, were not in 
■favor of the war; the lack of sympathy of the Russian public 
with the operations in the I'ar East, the insufticient conscious- 
Kiess of the necessity of liussian prepouderance in that region, 
were strongly felt; last of all, the admission that the enemy was 
right to a certain degree — all this brouglit a passive condition 
among the intellectual members of the Army, and could not in- 
spire it with the energy so necessary to victory. 

It is not to be doubted that the feelings of the intelligent 
part of the Army had penetrated into the rank and file. It is 
true that each officer and soldier, brought up in military disci- 



10 TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

pline, imbued with tlie fouimla of unswerving obedience to the 
chiefs, were ready to fulfill their duty according to their oath. 
But the enthusiasm was lacking, and consequently the powerful 
factor ensuring victory even to the weaker army ; there was a lack 
of intelligent comprehension of the aim and its attainment, serv- 
ing as a forceful and conscious motive power, and, according to 
the characteristics of tlie Japanese General J^odzu — as the prin- 
ciple of discipline, as stated in one of his orders to his army. 
My impression, in general, was that the troops would fight well 
w^henever their leaders would be at the necessary height; but 
where these would show lack of strength, the troops, having 
within them the germ of weakened discipline, might easily fall 
below the standard, since they ha.ve no intelligent understanding 
as to the aim of their activity. 

It was already known on January 7th that on the 12th 
Svould take place the offensive movement of our right flank (Gen- 
eral Grippenberg's army), and that, in case of success, the entire 
front would follow. I was advised to go to General Kaulbars' 
troops, occupying the center. I did so. Unfortunately, I did not 
witness the events which took place at Sandepoo, so that I report 
tliem not as an eye-witness, but according to absolutely trust- 
worthy narratives of others. 



Sandepoo and Vicinity 

SEAT OF.OPERATIONS 



January 12-15, 1905. 

{Appendix io ■•Truih About the War.") 

J. TABURNO. 

'scale. 




Chapter III. 

THE OPEEATIONS AT SAISTDEPOO. 

On the eve of the operations the condition of affairs on our 
right flank was as follows: In the nearest villages south and 
west of Sandepoo were small adA^anced detachments of the enemy 
•some two to three companies and one to two squadrons strong, 
while farther away, some 20 to 25 versts distant (at Tiadousian- 
poo and Siaobiakhe), were large reserves, and some comparatively 
small units in the other villages along tlie river Taytsekhe. 

The disposition of the Kussian troops was as follows: the 
Sth Corps was opposite Sandepoo; to the east of this point was 
tiie 10th; somewhat to the west, the 1st Siberian Corps: still 
more west. General Mischenko's army (between Sifontay and the 
Liaokhe River), the reserves being formed by the mixed Rifles 
Corps. 

The total strengtli of the Russians, of which they could 
'dispose for the attack, consisted of 84,000 bayonets and sabers.* 
(See the appended map.) 

The problem laid before these forces was, in general traits, 
(the following: The 1st Corps was to turn the left flank of the 
enemy, taking on its way the villages situated southwest of 
Sandepoo as far as Soumapoo (see appended map) ; after having 
taken possession of these villages, one brigade was to be detached 
and sent in the direction of the village of Dotay — i. e., almost in 
rear of Sandepoo. One division of the 8th Corps was to attack 
Sandepoo from the west, and at the same time the above- 

*The 8th Corps— 22,000 bayonets ; the 1st Siberian— 18,000 ; the mixed Rifles 
Corps— 16,000 ; General Mischenko's army— about 6,000 bayonets and sabers, and 
22,000 bayonets of the 10th Army Corps, although this unit was not to take part 
with its entire strength, in the attack. , ., 



12 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

mentioned brigade, placing itself under the orders of the com- 
mander of the 8tli Corps, was to attack from the south. The other 
division of the 8th Corps and the entire 10th Corps were to re- 
main in their positions and open fire against the enemy, thus 
attracting the attention of the Japanese by this demonstration and 
aiding the attacking units; after the taking of Sandepoo, they 
were to advance. 

General Mischenko^s troops were to make demonstrations in 
the rear of the enemy. 

The principal positions of the Japanese were strongly forti- 
fied along" the whole front. The advanced positions were masked 
by false hedges of ghiaolan; wire entanglements and wooden guns 
were placed at certain points. 

One division of the 8th Corps (the 14th, I believe), which 
was to attack Sandepoo, was, on the eve of the impending opera- 
tions, at Ashitor, where it had been sent for the support of Gen- 
eral Mischenko, sorely pressed by the Japanese after the unavail- 
able Inkou raid. The attack was consequently postponed until 
the arrival of this division. It reached the Eussian troops it« 
the night of January 12th, and, after a 30-verst march, without 
.having scarcely rested at all, went into battle early on the 12th, 
captured a row of settlements on the left bank of the river 
Khunkhe, some 2 to 3 versts from Sandepoo^. The 1st Siberian 
Army Corps occupied during the night of January 13th the 
village of Khongoutay, after which a stubborn fight ensued in 
the vicinity of Soumapoo, which it did not succeed in taking, 
in spite of reinforcements sent from the reserves. The occupa- 
tion of Khongoutay and the battle of Soumapoo cost almost half 
of this corps: about 10,000 men were put hors de combat. The 
brigade, which was to march against the village of Dotay and 
advance from that point with the 14th Division of the 8th 
Corps against Sandepoo, could not reach its destination, and, 
imder pressure of the enemy, marched not in the direction desig- 
nated, but turned to the north at a considerable distance from 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 13 

Datay, endeavoring to leave, the rayon in which it could cooperate 
in the attack of Sandepoo. :N'oticing the movements of this 
brigade, the commander of the 8th Corps made it turn 
back and placed it on the line Malandaii-Youoozipow. The bri- 
gade thus was' several hours late, in consequence of which it was 
necessary to arrest the advance of the 14:th Division, marching 
in the direction of Sandepoo according to the disposition. How- 
ever, coming under a shower of hostile bullets, it could not remain 
in inactivity under this iire, and alone attacked Sandepoo. Not- 
withstanding the stubborn defense of the enemy, the division suc- 
ceeded in capturing tlie suburbs of Sandepoo — Baoteytsze, Siao- 
sooza, and Lydziavopoo, which, on account of the lack of accurate 
survey sketches, were taken for Sandepoo itself and which were 
strongly fortified. This is why the chief of the division reported 
the taking of Sandepoo while in realiijy this was not so. Evacu- 
ating the suburbs, the Japanese left infernal preparations behmd 
tihem in the fanzas: everywhere along the walls, in the Tcanas;'' 
wherever it was at all possible, they placed and arranged all kinds 
of explosive material, as grenades, shrapnel, dynamite, etc., and 
at the last moment set fire to the fanzas, so that when our troops 
entered the place, all this exploded and we suffered great losses. 
I was told that on the tables were left small bags, seemingly con- 
taining money; the soldiers rushed towards tliem, took them up, 
and at that moment there was an explosion; it was found out 
that an electric current, causing the explosion, was closed at the 
time the bag was picked up. 

Sandepoo was consequently still to be taken. It proved to 
be strongly fortified by all kinds of means, including stone and 
beton fortifications. The troops of the 14th Division went into 
battle in remarkably good order, exactly as they were taught 
in time of peace. It was their baptism of fire. They were met 
with a hot rifle and machine-gun fire (the machine guns were 
first brought into .action during these operations). There was 

♦Along the walls a kind of brick settees are disposed at the height of a man's 
waist. There are conduits for heating running within these settees. 



j^^ THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

found before Sandepoo a lake covered with broken ice, of the 
size of which nothing was known and which was shown in the 
:wrong place on the map. In fact, the real plan of Sandepoo arid 
its vicinity had nothing in common with the plan of which we 
disposed. The enemy arrested our advance, and the 14th Divi- 
sion, being unable to maintain any longer the positions occupied 
by it, decided to retreat at 2 o'clock in the night. 

On that same day the mixed Eifles Corps, forming the 
reserve, marched to the rescue, and two of its regiments endeav- 
ored to attack Sandepoo a second time. This attempt remained 
without result and cost a great many victims — the Fifth Eegi- 
ment had only 300 men left in its ranks. 

During the above-mentioned operations the Japanese suc- 
ceeded in concentrating large bodies of troops in the center and 
in the neighborhood of Sandepoo ; counter-attacks were made here 
and great pressure was brought against the center. It was threat- 
ened with the breaking through of the lines. The Commander- 
in-chief then ordered to retreat to the former positions and to 
begin fortifying them. We lost in these operations about 14,000 
men in killed and wounded, and wasted over 67,000 projectiles, 
IBxhausting almost the entire supply of the Second Army (there 
remained only 5,000). 

Thus ended our attempt .to occupy Sandepoo and take here 
the offensive. At any rate, it could not have ended otherwise: 
the enemy had concentrated here 100,000 men, who had come 
[from under Port Arthur. This is when the premature surrender 
of Port Arthur was felt: should the fortress have held out one 
'week or ten days longer, the January operations at Sandepoo 
would undoubtedly have been crowned with success, and the con- 
sequences might have proved fatal to the enemy. It may be 
asked. Why had Kuropatkin not undertaken these operations 
eome ten days earlier? It was because the mixed Rifles Corps 
had not yet arrived from Russia, and Grippenberg's forces were 
insufficient without it. This is, at least,- the answer I received 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 15 

to this question; and, moreover, Greneral Kuropatkin did not 
expect a speedy fall of Port Arthur. 

During this action General Mischenko was wounded in the 
knee and General Kondratovich in the chest; two of the gen- 
erals loving their country and tme Piussian patriots, believing 
firmly in the strength and power of the Eussian people and the 
Eussian soldier. 



Cpiapter IV. 

THE DEPAETUEE OF GENEEAL GEIPPENBERG. 

After General Kuropatkin had given tlie order to return to 
Ithe positions and begin fortifying them, General Grippenberg, 
unwilling to remain under the command of General Kuropatkin, 
went back to St. Petersburg. It is difficult to give an explana- 
tion of such an action on the part of the commander of the Sec- 
ond Army. It was impossible for him not to know that his 
departure would have a very unfavorable influence upon the wfir. 
if General Grippenberg gathered from General Knropatkin's 
aetions at Sandepoo, as well as from things in general, that he 
;was not the man who ought to be at the head of the Manchurian 
Army, it would have been his duty as a citizen to lay his opinion 
before the Head of the Empire, even if his suppositions had not 
been foundj entirely accurate and proven — ^but only in case no 
personal reasons were involved in such an action. At any rate, 
he ought to have acted differently, and not have followed the 
course he chose. He might have sent to the Emperor a trust- 
worthy man as a messenger with a detailed report, and, without 
abandoning his post, awaited the imperial decision, sacrificing 
his personal feeling of amour propre for the time being. 

It is indubitable that Grippenberg's departure in the way he 
proceeded about it brought dire results. It is unpardonable for 
him to have overlooked them, as he could not be sure that the 
enemy would not take advantage of this incident. Alas! his 
departure played a poor role in the success of the Mulcden opera- 
tions. Is it possible that General Grippenberg did not suft'er 
within his heart jointly with every Eussian and every man lov- 
ing Eussia, at the news of the Mukden defeat? Is it not pos- 
sible that truth might be found in the conjectures of those who 

16 



TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE. WAR. 17 

believed General Grippenberg was not grieving so much over this 
painful fact, as ready to take advantage of it to corroborate his , 
t^pdnion that nothing else could have been expected of Kuropat- 
kin, and that this would not have taken place had any other man 
occupied Kuropatkin's post? 

Coming back, in particular, to the January operations at 
Sandepoo, I must state first O'f all the opiniou which General 
Grippenberg disseminated among the public by his interviews 
with newspaper correspondents, published in several papers. 

The General said that with the forces at his disposition he 
could have surrounded the enemy "with an iron ring" and de- 
stroyed him. I do not wish to call this boasting, or even self- 
delusion, but will say that it is only the outcome of his ignor- 
ance of the enemy and the fact of bemg carried away by his sub- 
ject. Why could not General Grippenberg take Sandepoo, since 
the Japanese forces 'defending this point were less strong in 
numbers than his own ? The taking of Sandepoo was the prin- 
icipal problem laid before him. How could he have carried out 
this entire operation when the forces of the enemy, occupying, 
moreover, strongly fortified positions, had increased, while he 
Vemained without any cover, the bitter frost impeding the troops 
from digging entrenchments? The statement that he could 
with an army of 60,000 men surround the Japanese troops, count- 
ing 100,000 soldiers, seasoned in the fights before Port Arthur, 
shows that he had not the slightest knowledge as to the enemy. 
There is no doubt as to the fact that the Japanese would con- 
tinue to reinforce their troops in the neighborhood of Sandepoo, 
a thing which could be prevented only in one way — ^by taking the 
offensive along the entire front. Such an operation was equiva- 
lent to suicide. General Grippenberg, as the commander of one 
of the armies, knew the mode and degree of fortification of the 
[hostile positions, and he must, consequently, have known that 
to attack these positions by the front was to lay down his troops 
before them without achieving any results in the same way as he 



IQ THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

wo'uld have laid low his entire army of 60^000 men had he at- 
tacked behind their fortified positions the troops of the enemy 
twice as strong numerically as his own. He had already lost 
14^000 out of his ranks. Independently of the fact that our 
(troops could have been destroyed, the enemy might have taken 
advantage of this victory and have advanced in the tracks of the 
defeated Second Manchurian Army, bringing about the destruc- 
tion of the entire Manchurian Army, the results being far more 
terrible than those which took placQ before Mukden about one 
month later. Was it possible for the Commander-in-chief to 
ignore this and to place on one card the outcome of thei entire 
war, basing his actions on the very dubious deductions of Gen- 
eral Grippenberg? Only the most critical condition of our Army 
could have forced the Commander-in-chief to put into execution 
the plan of General Grippenberg, and at that time the Eussian 
troops were not in such a situation. 

Should we even admit that General Ivuropatlvin was wrong 
throughout, yet in the operations at Sandepoo he acted rightly. 
Several corps commanders, who have participated in the Sande- 
poo affair and who do not defend General Kuropatkin, have said 
to me that we could not do anything else but retreat. Gener- 
ally speaking, the whole business — the advance against Sandepoo 
is rather incomprehensible. It is said, however, that it was in- 
sisted upon by General Grippenberg, who was its initiator. 

When General Kuropatkin learned of General Grippenberg's 
intention to leave the Army, he asked him to speak to him by 
'telephone; hut Gelneral Grippenberg, alleging siclaiess, refused 
his request;, proposing to carry on the negotiations by means of 
the officer of the day. General Kuropatkin asked then that the 
telephone be carried to the patient^s room, but the latter did 
not agree to this. After this General Kuropatlcin tried in writ- 
ing to make him desist from his intention to leave the Army. 
Eecognizing the usefulness of his service asi coinmander of the 
Second Army, he addressed himself to his sentiment of duty and 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE 1\'AR. IQ 

love of the Empemr, the Army, and his country, and pointed out 
to him that his departure might have great, unfavorable conse- 
quences. Nothing, no persuasions whatever, could induce Gen- 
eral Grippenberg to change the decision he had taken : self-love 
triumphed over duty. The excuses proffered by the Commander- 
in-chief and, maybe, even his humiliation (he wanted to come 
in person, but knew that he would not be received) could not 
palliate the offense of the ambitious General. All this is diffi- 
cult to believe. A man, invested with enormous power — the 
power of a dictator, the power o£ taking life — is forced to humil- 
date himself, to entreat his subordinate, though commander of 
an independent army, to fulfill his duty. Here we find the con- 
sequences, the worthy fruit, brought about by the bureautic regime. 
Here do we see clearly corruption and ruin. 

I have dwelt so long on this incident because the departure 
of General Grippenberg has been greatly commented upon in 
Eussia and in the Army among the officers and the soldiers 
whom news reaches in the most distorted guise. The soldier knew 
that General Grippenberg had refused to speak to the Commander- 
in-chief. According to comments, it was believed that General 
Ivuropatkin not only had no desire to take the defensive, but 
retreated when our troops could have defeated the enemy, and 
that this circumstance forced General Grippenberg to leave the 
Army. Thus we see that these comments destroyed, subordina- 
tion on the one hand, and on the other disseminated among the 
troops distrust of the Commander-in-chief — i. e., undermined the 
two elements which, in the present war, are the only motors of 
our Army. 



Chapter V. 

PKOPOSED SECOND ATTACK OF SANDEPOO. 

A lull ensued after the unsuccessful attempt to turn the 
left flank of the enemy. Mukden was again filled with officers, 
who had left the city for the time of the operations; the life 
of the rear, seething with gossip, quarrels, and drunkenness, was 
resumed. At the front the fortification of the positions was ardu- 
ously pursued. Our attention was principally drawn to our right 
flank. Our positions were speedily strengthened and large-caliber 
gun* were placed opposite Sandepoo. The enemy hkewise did 
not sleep; he also began strengthening his positions, especially 
those of the center, where they had placed 11-inch guns brought 
from before Port Arthur, which rendered them almost inacces- 
sible and allowed them to be idef ended by comparatively small 
units. 

Towards the end of January talk was current of a second 
attack on the Japanese left flank. An uncertain rumor in the 
beginning, it grew more and more defined until it was laiown 
in Mukden, and consequently among the Japanese, that the 12th 
of February was the day designated for the attack. As this date 
approached the rumors grew, awakening most improbable sup- 
positions : some asserted that we had resolved to succeed regard- 
less of cost; others maintained that the attempt would come to 
nothing and would involve great losses, that we would lay low 
several tens of thousands of men and win no results. I likewise 
shared the latter opinion, as it was known that the Japanese had 
concentrated 110,000 men at this point. 

The 10th of February set in. Anxiety for the issue of this 
attack began to take possession of everybody. 

Mukden was deserted; the officers joined their troops; the 

20 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 21 

Burgeons^ who were without work, likewise disappeared. The 
railway depot and the platform of the station^ where until then 
ilife seethed as in an anthill, were empty. The remaining sick 
were taken out of the hospitals and placed in cars to be trans- 
ported to the north, while these establishments were being 
cleaned and prepared to receive new victims of the war. The 
railway tracks near the stations were cleared, and the disorder 
which until now had reigned was superseded by order. Mukden 
was unrecognizable. The gay, even licentious life was replaced 
by serious concentration. All faces showed anxiety and pre- 
occupation. The Chinese were mysteriously silent, and the vari- 
ous traders, who had come from Eussia, Shanghai, and Chefoo, 
Caucasians, Greeks, Frenchmen — the inevitable evil following the 
Army like hungry dogs or ravens — looked careworn and conversed 
in whispers with each other. The evident coolness of the Eus- 
sians acted encouragingly upon them, and only the news that a 
turning movement was being made by the Japanese on Liaokhe, 
whispered for an instant and discredited by our Staff, darkened 
the faces. I always believed in the possibility of the success of 
such a turning movement, as it was known to me that one of out 
secret service men had sent a Chinaman with the news of the 
impending turning movement. But General Oukhar-Oronovich, 
in charge of tlie service of information, drove him out, disbeliev- 
ing the report, and even desisting from paying him the sum 
agreed to with the agent. Moreover, a Chinaman spoke to me 
about this turning movement; all this taking place in the first 
days of February. 

In the morning of the 11th I went to the staff of the Sec- 
ond Army. On the square, along the road to the depot, quiet 
reigned supreme, and only from time to time somebody would 
be seen hurrying to the train going south. 

Upon arriving at the rayon of the Second Army I noticed 
great activity. The troops were already in their positions. An 
observation post had been arranged for General Kaulbars, com- 



22 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

manding the army. To-inorrow or the day after^ according to 
order, a fierce battle would begin, carrying off several tens of 
thousands of the best citizens of two nations. 

The spirit of the troops was cheerful : all were glad of tak- 
ing the offensive, all were ready to die so they be allowed to 
advance and not to retreat. "We have to die anyhow; at least 
Het us die attacking, and not retreating, as we have done so far, ' 
were the words heard among the officers and men. The Eussian 
soldier does not like to retreat. All thirst to rush against the 
enemy, while what comes next will be as the Lord God wills and 
the luck of war brings. Here, among these intrepid soldiers, 
who, without any other thought, are ready to lay down their lives 
only out of duty and the oath given to the Emperor and their 
country, the heart grows more peaceful and pusillanimity has 
no room. 

A great number of guns was concentrated on our front in the 
neighborhood of Sandepoo. It was proposed to prepare the attack 
by artillery fire, a thing we had overlooked in the January opera- 
tions. The plan of Sandepoo was taken from a balloon. This 
village proved to be nothing but one mass of fortifications — 
•stone redoubts, bombproof shelters, wire entanglements, pits, etc. 
The day of the attack was kept secret; at least, it was thought 
to be a secret, though many spoke openly of the 12t;h^ of February 
as being the date designated. After the departure of G-eneral 
Grippenberg, General Kaulbars was given, on February 3d, the 
t'ommand of the Second Army. It was reinforced by a mixed 
brigade, composed of picked men of the 1st Kifles Corps, and 
was drawn up on the right bank of the river Khunkhe. 

Before the proposed attack the Second Army, which was to 
lead this operation, consisted of the 8th Army Corps — 32 bat- 
talions, 4 sotnias, and 152 guns, in position opposite Sandepoo; 
the 10th Army Corps — 32 battalions, G sotnias, and 138 guns, 
in position to the left (somewhat east of the 8th Corps) ; the 
mixed Rifles Corps — 32 battalions and 114 guns, on the right 



THE TRUTH ABOUT TH£ WAR. 23 

(west of the 8th. Army Corps) ; further the Liaokhe detachment — 
12 sotnias and 16 guns; and still more to the west, General 
Rennenkampf's (formerly General Mischenko's) detachment — 26 
sotnias, 32 guns, and the remainder of the Orenburg Division of 
General Tolmachoff — about 31/2 sotnias. The\ reserve was formed 
by the 1st Siberian Army Corps, already under General Gern- 
gross — 30 battalions, 6 squadrons, and 6-1 guns. The total nu- 
merical streng-th of the Second Army amounted to 115,000 bay- 
onets and sabers and 516 guns. In addition to this, the Second 
Army could count upon tlie support of the general strategic re- 
serves of the Commander-in-chief, consisting of from 15,000 to 
20,000 bayonets and 50 guns. Consequently the strength could 
be increased to 130,000 bayonets and sabers and 570 guns — quite 
a formidable force. 

xiccording to the disposition, drawn up on the 9th or 10th 
of February, the 8th Army Corps was to take possession of San- 
■depoo after the artillery preparation; the 10th Corps was to 
capture several villages situated east of Sandepoo and await the 
results of the operations of the 8th Army Corps, while support- 
ing the latter; the mixed liifies Corps was to secure/ the occu- 
pation of Sandepoo; the duties of the cavalry lay in the observa- 
tion and security service on the right flank. Such, in general 
traits, was the problem laid before the Second Army. The above- 
mentioned disposition was not made known to the army before- 
hand, but was to be delivered at the last moment, together with 
the order designating the day of the attack. 

But it was found out towards the evening of February 11th: 
(1) that the Japanese were cognizant of our disposition, includ- 
ing the minutest details; (2) that the enemy had concentrated 
over 120,000 men against our Second Army; (3) that the Jap- 
lanese were advancing against the 10th Army Corps and likewise 
east of this unit; and (4) that large hostile bodies of troops 
'attacked and pressed upon our left flank. It was decided to 



u 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



desist from a second operation against Sandepoo. The 1st 
Siberian Army Corps and General Eennenkampf received orders 
to march to the left flank of the First Army (General Eennen- 
kampf started immediately^ while the 1st Corps came afterwards). 
It was evident that a serions affair was close at hand. But w^here ? 
Therein lay the entire question. 



Chapter Yl. 

DIAEY OF EVENTS NEAK MUDKEjST. 

The further course of events in the vicinity of Mukden I 
'will give in the shape of a diary, such as I wrote them down on 
the spot. 

February IS. — The weather was dreadful; a snowstorm 
was raging. It was proposed that the troops of the Third Army 
should take the bridge on the Shakhe Eiver while the other units 
were making demonstrations. The bridge was taken, but on tlie 
following day it was retaken by the enemy. 

During the night of the 13th and 14th. of February the troops 
of the Second Army attacked and occupied BaotayHze, but could 
not keep this point. The ohhotniks harassed, the enemy. The 
Liaokhe detachment, in observation at Liaokhe, has been re- 
formed. It is incomprehensible. It is said that, on acccount of 
General Rennenkampf s detail to the left wing and the illness of 
General Mischenko, tliere is nobody to whom the command of 
this unit could be entrusted. This is very difficult to believe. 

February IJfth and 15th. — The Japanese attack along the 
entire front. The turning column has been clearly defined. Gen- 
eral Biirger, commanding one brigade of infantry, artillery, prob- 
ably three batteries, and cavalry, started on a forced march to 
Sinmintin for the purpose of occupying this point. He was too 
late — it was occupied by the Japanese before the arrival 'of the- 
Russian detachment, and Burger was forced to go back. By this 
time the Japanese had already occupied the road from Sinmintin 
to Mukden ; it was necessary to divide the troops into two detach- 
ments: the one arrived at the Imperial Tombs, the other to the 
Youshitay station, and the artillery lost its train. 

February 16th. — The mixed Rifles Corps on the right flank 

25 



26 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

was to take the positions of the 8th Army C'orps^ while this unit 
was to march to the north in the vicinity of Mukden. But the 
^nixed Rifles Corps proved incapable of solving this problem, 
and, pressed by the enemy, retreated partly to the left bank of 
the Khunkhe and partly to Peytkhoza, Shuango, and Maturan. 
A cannonade started at 6 :30 a. m. and lasted until nightfall. 
The enemy attacked several times our positions in front of Bey- 
taydze, but uiisuccessfully. Preparations for retreat began to be 
made at 3 :30 p. m. The artillery materiel was being taken of! 
from the positions and sent away on February 17th. 

February 17th. — The 8th Army Corps occupied the rear 
positions and it fell to tlie share of these troops to cover the re- 
treat instead o^f the mixed Rifles Corps. It was found out at 
7 a. m. that Siaolapooza was occupied by hostile troops consist- 
ing of the three arms. At the same time the Japanese made 
energetic attacks against the 8th Army Corps from the south 
and gradually likewise from the right bank of the Khunkhe, 
where the 9th Division O'f General Nogi^s army was operating 
with four batteries which opened a hot fire. It was difficult for 
the 8th Corps to withstand a simultaneous attack almost from 
three sides: from the south, the west, and partly from the rear. 
The commander of the corps rode to Maturan to the commander 
of the Second Army, in order to report in person on the condi- 
tion of affairs. Just at that time General Kaulbars was seeing 
ofl; the 1st Siberian Army Corps, which was to advance at a 
forced march to our left flank to join General Linevich^s troops. 
One brigade of the 72d Division was likewise sent there. Gen- 
eral Kaulbars sent out of his strategic reserve two batteries and 
two infantry regiments as reinforcements to the 8th Corps; they 
were to take up positions in the river bend opposite Petkhoza 
(shown on the map), so as to attack the Japanese in the flank. 
'Their operations assisted the 8th Corps, and the Japanese were 
forced to retreat from the positions occupied by them. After 
their defeat at this point, the Japanese marched towards the north 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 27 

and occupied the village of Seritkliayza. A mixed division was 
formed towards the evening, which, under command of General 
Golembatrovski, crossed the river at Shuango in order to attack 
the enemy at Sentkhayza. The Japanese were driven out of this 
point, where they left even several machine guns behind. This 
fcuccessful attack arrested tlie advance of the Japanese on the 
left bank of the Khunkhe, but could not impede the enemy from 
marching towards the north. 

General Kaulbars left for Mukden, General Launitz taking 
temporarily the command of the Second Army, who also directed 
the retreat. On that day the enemy occupied the village of Salin- 
poo, situated 16 versts west of the Mukden station. The 25th' 
Division was! sent here, and at 3 p. m. it was met by the enemy 
with a hot fire. Our attacks were repulsed, and the enemy made 
several counter-attacks, which we succeeded in repulsing, causing 
great losses to the hostile troops. On both sides they were large : 
ours amounted to 2,000, while those of the Japanese were still 
greater. The fight lasted well into the night. 

A new disposition was drawn up on accouni^ of the retreat 
of the mixed Eifies Corps, according to which the retreat of the 
Second Army was to be made in the following order: the 10th 
CorjDs was to march on the village of Touelpoo; the 8th Corps 
(the 14th Division on Tatay and the 15th Division marching in 
the rear guard along the left bank of the IQiunkhe) was to cover 
the general retreat of the Second Army; the column of Gen- 
eral Tolmachoff was to protect the right tlank, and the column 
of Golembatovski had to march along the right bank of the 
Khunkhe, moving on a line with the 15th Division. This col- 
umn,, forming part of the rear guard, was, for some reason or 
other, not subordinate to the chief of the rear guard, but some 
other who was not operating here. 

February 18th. — At 2 a. m. the Second Army received orders 
to begin immediately the retreat. When General Ivanoff, chief 
of the 15th Division, approached Davanganpoo, it was found 



28 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



that the opposite bank of the Khunkhe (tlie village of Shuango) 
was occupied by the Japanese, and Golembatovski was no^^^ere 
to be found, as he had marched to Mukden in obedience to orders 
received from someone. This, naturally, brought disorder into 
the plan of the retreat. General Ivanoif, having remained at 
that point for some time and allowed his troops to rest, began 
to retreat on Tsantap'oo; but, not finding here the troops of the 
10th Corps, which were to await his arrival at this point, and 
attacked by the enemy in the hank, he retreated to the village of 
Tatay, where the troops of the Third Army had arrived by that 
time. As the enemy was concentrating large forces in the Salin- 
poo rayon, the Second Army was ordered to assemble on the 
right bank of the Khunkhe, while the Third was tO' occupy posi- 
tions between the Khunkhe and the bridge over the Shakhe 
(Soukhoudiapoo-Laiishanpooi-Linshinpoo'-Sakhepoo) . The troops 
of the Second Army moved towards the Khunkhe in two col- 
umns, the one formed of the infantry and the other of the artil- 
lery and the train. Some way or other, both columns reached 
one point of crossing. On account of this, and alsO' because Gen- 
eral Churin's brigade was drawn up at the crossing on the oppo- 
site banlv, thus impeding the movement, confusion arose and 
some disorder ensued. It was difficult to cross over on the ice; 
it broke under the artillery and heavy wagons, and the crossing 
Was effected with great difficulty, the infantry remaining un- 
der arms throughout the entire night. 

Part of the wounded remained in Davanganpoo. General 
Myloff ordered the sanitary transports to go at a trot to Davangan- 
poo for the wounded, and almost all of them were luckily brought 
over; however, many of those who could not get into the ambu- 
lances walked all night with great difficulty until they reached 
the railway line (the coaling branch), by which they were 
transported to Mukden. Stores of provisions and other supplies 
were partly burnt and partly abandoned. This fate fell to the 
share of the entire Decaville Eailway net, established for the serv- 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 29 

ice of our positions. Lastly the troops of the Second Army Corps 
crossed over to the right bank, and the troops of the Third Army 
were located between the Khimkhe and the Shakhe. Here 
began the fractioning of the large iinits. Foreseeing that the 
trains conld only impede the movements of the troops, the 
commanders of the 10th and 8th Army Corps sent them to 
the north towards Telin, and, thanks to this disposition, these 
trains were the only ones saved. In the morning of February 18th 
a fight began near the village of Salinpoo, and continued until 
evening. We could not withstand the attack of the enemy, 
and retreated. 

February 19th. — The troops of the Second Armv occupied 
the positions Madiapoo-Youkhuantun-Fansintun-Padiaza. The 
units were all mixed up, but not accidentally; this took place 
by special order. Thus the 8tli and the mixed Eifles Corps de- 
tachments were to be f omid everywhere. It was quiet on that 
day on tlie front west of Mukden. We put the troops in order 
and occupied positions, while the Japanese were reinforcing their 
front at this point. The hostile column marched along the road 
from Sinmintjn to the village of Tashichao. The 1st Siberian 
Corps, which had been sent to the left flank, w^ns again called 
back, and was thus obliged to make again a forced march of 
60 versts without taking any rest. The enemy occupied to- 
wards dawn the village of Soukhoudiapoo, on the lefii bank of 
the Khunklre, and later the village of Lanshanpoo, so that the 
front of the Third Army was somewhat shifted to the east 
(Madiapoo -lOioudiapoo -Eltgazooza -Tasoudiapoo -Lanshanpoo- 
Sakhepoo). To the north of the river Khunkhe no encounters 
took place to-day. The guard detachments of the hostile turn- 
ing column were detected some 8 to 9 versts west of the Mukden 
station, opposite the village of Youkhuantun. 

Fehruary 20th. — The 1st Siberian Corps has arrived from the 
left flank. The men are very tired. The Japanese have taken 
the offensive in the rayon Madiapoo-Oulinpoo-Yasytun on a front 



30 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

some 5 to 6 versts in extension; all their! three stubborn attacks 
were rei^nlsed. General Tserpitski^ commanding the troops at 
this point_, reported that three Japanese divisions were operating 
against him; I think that this is exaggerated^ although it would 
be very important for the Japanese to break through the Russian 
lines at this pointy for then thq}? could cut our army in two ; it is 
therefore possible that large forces have been directed to this local- 
ity. Our troops have occupied the village of ^N'ewsytun, also Tin- 
tiantun and Igsytay after an insignificant fight. On the left 
bank of the Khunkhe the enemy pressed hard on the village of 
Elthaytze^ but all, his seven attacks were repulsed towards event- 
ing with great losses. The villages of Padiaza and Paodaotun 
were occupied by us in the evening after a fight for them. E'orth 
of the Khunkhe our troops were not very active either yesterday 
or to-day; if we except the repulsed attacks in the rayon of 
Madiapoo-Yasytun^ there were no fights Avhatever. The reason 
for this inaction lay in the necessity of finding out the distribu- 
tion of the units. But did this necessitate so much time? Was 
everything done to ascertain the disposition of the troops in the 
shortest time possible? Was not the cause of such slowness in 
the proceedings to be found in the self-love ol a chief or institu- 
tion? At any rate, this two days^ inactivity on the front west 
of Mukden, when the enemy was still weak, had most fatal con- 
sequences. Towards evening our troops occupied the following 
•positions on the western front: General Tserpitski, with 34 
battalions, - from Madiapoo to Youkhuantun ; further. General 
Topornin, with 16 battalions, as far as the Sinmintin road; 
further still. General Gemgross, with 49 battalions; then came 
small detachments under Colonels Zapolski and Tsiekhanovichj 
General Burger, who had returned from under Sinmintin, and 
Colonel Bolkhovitinoff. General TIanenfeld commanded the re- 
serve of 4 battalions. There were in all on that front about 120 
battalions and from 400 to 450 guns. These troops occupied the 
'following positions : Madiapoo-Pulinpoo-Yasytun, Youkhuantun,- 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 31 

Newsyntun, Tintiantim, Igsytay, Fansytun, Padiaza, Paodaotun, 
Santayze. 

February 21st. — The Japanese stubbornly attacked our posi- 
tions in the vicinity of Oulinpoo-Yasytun ; they wanted at any 
cost to drive us out, for if they should sncceed here, it would 
be easy for them to reach the railway line and, seizing the cross- 
ing over the Khunivhe, cut off the retreat of our Third Army. 
Our troops often allowed the attacking detachment to approach 
within 200 to 100 paces and then opened a concentrated fire 
against them, and the enemy retreated, leaving literally heaps of 
corpses behind him. During that time the troops of General 
Gerngross continued successfully their retreat; they advanced in 
the rayon of the Sinmintin road and, after a stubborn fight, occu- 
pied Tsuanvanche, situated some 4 versts froui Tashichao, the 
occupation of which was their principal aim. His Majesty's 1st 
Siberian Kegiment was operating liere. 

The ranks are thinning. The losses are great, the men 
are tired, exhausted, having achieved a forced march of 60 versts 
immediately before the fight. The commander of the regiment 
feels that he is unable to take this important pomt; the enemy 
will try to keep it at any cost. In answer to his request for 
reinforcements, Colonel Losch receives the following answer: 
^The commander of the troopsi is dissatisfied with your procrasti- 
nation." ^ight came and Tashichao was not taken. The com- 
mander of the regiment was unable to order a night attack. The 
soldiers fell and went olf to sleep while marching. During the 
night the enemy increased his forces, so that on the following 
day it was found impossible to take the village, not only with the 
1st Siberian Regiment, but even with greatly increased forces. 

Early in the morning hundreds of guns began to roar and 
thousands of men advanced against each other. The desperate 
attacks of the tlapanese were sucessfully repulsed by our troops. 
The course of the retreat was strewn with corpses. Whole 
mounds of dead bodies rose in front of the entrenchments. Our 

3- 



32 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

opposition increased tlie stubbornness of the Jaipanese and one 
attack was followed by another, each one more fierce than the 
other. The results remained the same: they did not succeed 
in breaking us. 

The Japanese wanted at any cost to take possession of the 
village situated some G to 7 vei^sts from the Mukden station. 
After having suffered enormous losses^, they at last succeeded in 
taking it. But the point was too important to be left in the 
hands of the enemy, and our troops reconquered it by a desperate 
counter-attack. The enemy^ strengtliened by reinrorcements, 
again took possession of it and the village passed four times from 
the hands of the one into those of the other. Lastly the com- 
mander of the corps, General Tsei-pitski, led an entire regiment 
5nto the attack for the purpose of maintaining this point in. our 
hands. AYhat a magnificent picture! The band playing, the 
banners waving, the regiment went into battle, its commander 
in the lead. Drawing themselves up to their full height, seeming 
to be still taller than in reality, the soldiers advanced bravely 
as if on parade, scorning all d'anger. The front ranks fell, others 
took their place. It seemed that nothing could withstand this 
Titanic onslaught. And, in reality, the enemy did not hold out, 
and fied, covering the field with corpses in his retreat. The 
village remained in our hands, and the enemy no more en- 
deavored to take it from us. It is difficult to imagine a more 
terrible and at the same time a mora majestic picture than this 
battle. The impassibility and courage of our troops were simply 
astounding. 

The occupied village presented a fearful aspect. The 
streets, the courtyards, the fanzas were filled with the dead and 
Avounded. It was impossible to take a step without touching a 
human body. Four times was the village occupied by the enemy 
and by us, and the corpses lay in strata. The aspect of the; 
wounds was dreadful — each time the fight ended with bayonet 
thrusts. The fanzas were filled with wounded^ who were 



TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 33 

icapable of crawling from under the corpses piled above them. 
There were Japanese and our men, but now they were no more 
enemies — a common fate made them feel near to each other, and 
they lay down side by side, helping each other to dress in some 
way their bleeding and mutilated limbs. Where had disappeared 
tlie anger, the hatred, and the desire to destroy each other? The 
area west of the village was strewn with Japanese corpses, while 
to the east it was covered with the bodies of our men — i. e., on 
the side from which each attacked and retreated. 

I think that not less than 3,000 to 4,000 men laid down their 
lives on both sides for the possession of this village. Such ali'airs 
may be counted by the score in the present war. 

And the fight of the Zaraysk Eegiment? The enemy at- 
tacked with large forces the village occupied by this regiment. 
The Japanese opened fire, but it was not answered; without ceas- 
ing to fire, they advanced, without meeting with any opposition. 
They knew by experience that the Kussians did not leave their 
positions without giving fight, and that each of their successes 
has been dearly paid. There remained only some 150 paces to the 
village when a volley was fired; the front rard^s fell and their 
places were fallen by others, but they met with a similar fate ; the 
third and fourth ranks laid down in rear of their dead and wanted 
to silence the fire of the Zaraysk men by a deadly shower of bullets, 
but could not withstand their well-aimed firing, and ran, though 
few of them reached their positions. The corpses in this affair 
formed literally large hills. It looked from a distance as if heaps 
of goods had been piled on a large area.. Heart-rending cries 
sounded from these mounds of human bodies, while to the west 
there extended a ribbon of other corpses, thickly strewn in the 
beginning and growing thinner as it receded into the distance. 
It was sickening to gaze at all these horrors, all these dead bodies, 
of which breastworks were made, putting them transversally, some 
hundreds of sajens in extension, for the purpose of hurling death 
at the living from behind those dead ones. And the moans rising 



34 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



from these mounds of human bodies! Cries o^f despair rang 
out from the tortured soul: "It is enough! For God's sake, 
enough of this slaughter! Stop! You are not beasts; you are 
men, belonging to civilized nations !" But this human invocation 
died unheeded, drowned by the cries of "Hurrah!'' and "Ban- 
zai!" The feeling of humanity was crushed by practical con- 
siderations, the interests of the country being on the first plan, 
and not the destruction of these hundreds of thousands of men. 
The grateful descendants will live over their tombs a better life, 
will mourn for them, and the monuments erected in their honor 
will remain as an eternal remembrance of their glorious death. 

Yet, while folly conscious of these horrors, fully conscious 
that, according to God's law, no one has the right to kill, one can- 
not help admiring the actions of these heroes, dealing deadly blows 
to their enemies. Such is the remarkable constitution of human 
nature. 

And the attacks of the 1st Siberian Regiment? Oh, what 
troops ! They are capable of carrying away the most cold-blooded 
man. They seemed not to see the enemy before them, not to feel 
their deadly machine-gun fire, not to notice the continuous flight 
of the heated metal. They did their duty as if on parade before 
their chief. I was accompanied by a correspondent of an Amer- 
ican paper, the Chicago Daily News, who had been present as 
a correspondent at all the wars of the latter time, and he said 
to me and wrote to his paper that he had never witnessed any- 
thing like it, and that such pictures could be seen only) once in 
a lifetime. 

There would be no end to the description of the heroic deeds 
of our troops. 

That day belonged to the Russians, as was communicated by 
that correspondent to his paper. 

February 22d. — The Japanese are fiercely attacking from 
early morning our positions at Yansintun-Youkhuantun, but, hav-, 
ing suffered great losses, towards 10 a. m. they desisted from 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 35 

further attacks. Feeling probably that they could not break 
through into the rayon Madiapoo-Yansintun, they tried during 
tlie day to attack the village of Youkhuantun, proposing to move 
afterwards to the Mukden station along a road on which there 
is not a single village up to the very station. The enemy suc- 
ceeded in taking this village. We were threatened by great 
danger ynd the corps commander himself led the regiment (the 
Minsk^ I believe) into the battle. The enemy was repulsed. The 
Japanese made likewise energetic attacks in the Tashichao rayon 
and north of it. Here we retreated^ abandoning the villages of 
Tsuanvanche^ Padiaza, and Paodiatan, north of the Imperial 
Tombs, nnd which we had occupied yesterday. It was felt that 
the enemy was increasing his strength in that direction, endeavor- 
ing to occupy the railway line, so as to cut off our way of retreat. 
The enemy approached the railway, and at a distance of 4 versts 
from it began to fire at the passing trains. The telegraph was 
damaged one time. It was repaired under fire by the railway 
employees under the supervision of Controller Preobrajenski. It 
was necessary to have recourse to extraordinary measures for the 
driving back of the enemy. For this purpose the Orsk and Oro- 
vaysk Eegiments, supported by two battalions of the Insar Eegi- 
ment, advanced under command of Colonel Borisoff and occupied 
the village of Siaotuza. At tliat time the enemy was discovered 
north of that point some 10 versts from the railway off the 
Youshitay station. In that direction our cavalry detachment had 
antercepted yesterday the enem}^, probably his advanced posts, 
and thrown them back. Great fatigue is noticed. It is the fourth 
day that a continuous battle is being waged in the neighborhood 
of Mukden. 

February 23cl. — The enemy was pressing hard on that day 
in the rayon Padiaza-Paodaotun-Tkhenitun. We were some- 
what driven back here and occupied the following positions: 
Youkhuantun - Sandialir - Kholikha - Sakhedza - Takhetun - Say- 
tadze - Siaogotiza - Tsuertun. General Myloff was invested with 



36 TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

the command of Colonel Borisoff's troops^ which were to be 
reinforced by the division of Qeneral Artamonoii and General 
Herschelmann with 6 battalions^ thus making a total of 25 bat- 
talions. Colonel Borisoff occupied the villages of Tunchandza 
and Kusantun, but at this point he was lired at in the flank from 
the village of Tkhenitun. As yesterda/s attack of the enemy 
against Youkhuautun^ which cost him great losses, remained 
resultless, he again rushed to'-day against the village of New- 
sintun, but the same fate awaited these attacks. Our troops, pur- 
suing the enemy, took the offensive and made many prisoners. 

The First and Third Armies retreated on the positions sit- 
uated on the left bank of the Khunkhe ; the retreat went off with- 
out any encounters. Some of the units set fire to their stores 
before moving, and thus disclosed prematurely their retreat. 

February 2Jf.th. — A strong typhoon was raging to-day. Ev- 
erything was covered with a compact cloud of dust of enormous 
dimensions, penetrating everywhere and into everything, driven 
by a fierce gale. The dust fills the ears, eje^, nose, and mouth; it 
is difficult to breathe and impossible to see — nothmg can be made 
out at a distance of a few paces. A thick layer of dust covers the 
men occupying the trenches. An evil fate is pursuing us. Not- 
witlistanding this, our troops recaptured the village of Sataydze, 
which the enemy had taken from us. The enemy wanted to cap- 
ture at any price the railway at this point, but our troops repulsed 
all their attacks with stubborn resistance. C4eneral Myloff took 
the ofi;ensive: Colonel Borisoff was to take Gosytun and General 
Herschelmann was to take Khenitun. The attack was desig- 
nated to begin at 11 :30 a. m., as otherwise the enemy might 
take the offensive. General Launitz, commanding the troops in 
the rayon Khoiikha-Talvhetun-'Santaydze, was not able to iissist 
General Myloff, the enemy fiercely attackmg him, endeavoring 
to break through his ranks at any cost. At this time the 
Commander-in-chief arrived for the purpose of personally direct- 
ing the troops towards Tkhenitun, expressed to General Mylolf 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. . 37 

his dissatisfaction at tiie premature attack, made without any 
orders from him, and rode further to the north. Colonel BorisofE 
occupied Gosytun and fell mortally wounded in the fight. In spite 
!of his stubborn attacks, General Herschelmann did not succeed 
in taking Tkhenitun, as this point was occupied by an entire hos- 
tile division, but succeeded in arresting the advance of the enemy. 
■Kuropatkin arrived here abont 2 p. m., and, having investigated 
ithe condition of aKairs, approved of General Myloff's decision, 
admitting that the operation undertaken by him was timely. The 
Japanese concentrated large forces in this locality and continued 
their movement to the north. 

Towards evening the enemy broke through in the vicinity 
of Kiousan. It was ascertained at the same time that a detach- 
men of Japanese occupied the village of Tasintun, situated some 
10 versts northwest of the Khushitay station. It was found im- 
possible to oppose large forces to the enemy at Khushitay. The 
breaking through of the center by the Japanese was not found 
fls important as supposed, as the enemy's forces were not consid- 
erable at this point. Order was given for all the troops to retreat 
to Telin. General Myloff was ordered to maintain the positions 
occupied by him, and to repulse the attaclcs of the enemy until 
the Second and Third Armies reached their destination. The 
retreat of the three armies began in the night of February 24th 
and 25th. 

Fehruary 25th.— On the eve of this day Kuropatkin told 
General Myloff that he would send a brigade to occupy the vil- 
lage of Tava on the Mandarin Eoad, to keep the Japanese from 
taking the rear guard in the rear. But this morning the Jap- 
anese began to lire against Tsuertun from the west and east, and 
it was found out that no brigade had been sent to Tava. It was 
necessary to maintain the positions at any cost, as far from all 
the troops had marched by and the rear guard, counting 25 bat- 
talions in all, whose ranks had been consideral^ly thinned already, 
had to fight on two fronts. General Kaulbars rode by in the 



38 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

evening, and repeated the Commander-in-cliief^s order to keep 
the positions until all the troops had passed, until General Lau- 
nitz had marched by with his detachment. It was absolutely 
above human endurance to stand the cross-fire of the enemy. 
The chief of Staff, General Martoss, endeavored to arrest several 
retreating battalions, but they did not obey him. General Kaul- 
bars arrived and forced them to submit. A few new battalions 
brought into the fire helped to drive the enemy back and the 
narrow passage fired at by the enemy grew somewhat wider. If 
these new battalions had not been brought into action, the real 
guard would have been surrounded by the Japanese and destroyed. 
The Staff thought that if the rear guard, commanded by General 
Myloff, would succeed in protecting the march past of all our 
troops, it could not avoid destruction. The troops kept up bravely, 
fully conscious of the importance of the problem laid upon them, 
but there were very trying moments for the conmianders. For 
example, at the time that General Launitz's troops were retreat- 
ing from the southwest, several units passing through the chains 
of sharpshooters of the rear guard carried away in the general re- 
treating movement the men forming the chain. Due praise must 
be given General Myloff for his courageous and .skillful arrest of 
large hostile forces until all our troops, including the artillery and 
train, had passed. It is difficult to credit that a handful of) men, 
as compared to the forces of the enemy, could arrest the advanc- 
ing Japanese army. In addition to this, General Myloff was 
often forced to restore order in the retreating troops, by calling 
upon the chiefs of the units. 

The remnant of the Modlin Kegiment, about 1 l^attalion, 
occupied the wodds around the Imperial Tombs., probably mak- 
ing up the reserve. The order to retreat was forgotten to be given 
to these men. While passing onward some of the retreating sol- 
diers came upon the wood, many men of various units thus gath- 
ering tliere. Seeing there an entire unit, they halted. Suddenly 
the enemy began to fire at them from all sides — they were sur- 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 39 

rounded. The field officers were all killed, and there remained 
only two captains — ^Ivanofl: and another, whose name I do not 
remember. The soldiers who did not belong to the Modlin Eegi- 
ment began to grow excited; tlie Japanese demanded their sur- 
render. 1 do not know in what way two more banners were found 
here in addition to the standard of the Modlin Eegiment. All 
were saved, thanks to the heroic deed of Captain Ivanoff. He 
pushed through the soldiers and cried : "I am the commander 
of the Modlin Eegiment; all must obey me."' (He wore a jacket 
without any shoulder-straps, and consequently his rank could not 
be determined.) Seeing that the Modlin men obeyed him, the 
soldiers of the other regiments likewise gathered around him. 
When all were assembled and distributed, Ivanoff took the icon 
he was wearing on his chest under his clothes, and, holding it in 
one hand, raised his sword high with the other, and crying, "Fol- 
low me, brethren!" rushed forward. Inspired by his example, 
the soldiers made a bayonet attack and repulsed the enemy, break- 
ing through their ranks and saving all the banners. Many fell 
in this heroic fight. May God rest their souls! It seems to me 
that Cap Lain Ivanoff has been presented for the St. George. 

In the night, when the troops had finished passing by, the 
rear guard abandoned its positions and began to retreat along 
the railway. The soldiers marched singing. According to the 
disposition, the troops had to halt on the river Pukhe at the 
point where it crossed the railway, here to arrest the advance of 
the enemy should he come up to this phice before all our troops 
had gone to a certain distance. At one place the road was found 
obstructed or, rather, covered with men, who impeded the march 
of the artillery and train. On the road and on both sides of it 
men lay in a dense mass; fires were burning everywhere. Sev- 
eral regiments were found here, whose men were incapable of 
moving on out of sheer fatigue. General Mylofl; quickly assem- 
bled the chiefs of these troops, gave orders first of all to extin- 
guish the fires, which could attract the enemy, explained the 



40 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

condition of affairs, and ordered to rise immediately and march 
on for at least 10 versts. With a heavy heart did the chiefs assem- 
ble their men and move on. 

General Myloff received on the road the order of the com- 
mander of the Second Army to draw up a disposition for the 
.occupation of the following position^ according to which the right 
flank on the left bank of the Pukhe was to be occupied by Gen- 
eral Artamonoff, while the center and left Hank were to be com- 
manded by General Herschelmann. 

The train moved and the artillery rattled in rear of the 
marching troops. From time to time a gun or a wagon was over- 
turned and arrested the movement of the troops. Time passed, 
and by n^orning the new positions had to be occupied so as to 
arrest the pursuing enemy. 

Confusion took place at the crossing of the I*ukhe: every- 
one desired to be the fir&t to get to the other bank; the banks 
were steep, and the two existing roads did not allow of a rapid 
crossing over of the entire train, the artillery and the men. The 
chief of the rear guard ordered new passages to be made, and, 
thanks to these, the crossing was soon effected. 

February 2Gtli. — According to the disposition, the rear guard 
occupied in the morning positions on the left bank of the Pukhe. 
The enemy soon reached this point and opened artillery and 
rifle fire. A turning movement was feared, as the Japanese were 
both on the right and the left north of the rear-guard position. 
It is necessary to mention here a painful incident : General Arta- 
monoff, who occupied the right flank, without breathing a word 
to anybody, retreated north to Telin. It was necessary to dis- 
tribute hastily among the remaining troops the positions aban- 
doned by General Artamonofl. 

During the night the rear guard continued its retreat and 
reached the station of Saytadze. One of Artamonoif's brigades 
was caught up with here, the brigade of General Petereff; the 
other, commanded by Artamonoff himself, had gone to Telm. 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. ^i 

General Kaulbars, who was at that time at the station., reproved 
General Peterefl and ordered him and General Churinoff^s bri- 
gade to remain in tlie rear guard, relieving General Myloff and 
General Herschelmann and their troops, exhausted by continuous 
fights and marches during four days, throughout which the men 
!had hardly slept at all. General ]\lylof!", whose hernia, already 
once operated upon, had been aggravated by a fall he had with 
his horse, was in a serious condition oni account of physical and 
mental strain. General Kaulbars remained for some time per- 
sonally with the rear guar(J. General Myloff^s detachment was 
leaving the Saytadze station when the Japanese occupied the vil- 
lage of Iloo, situated on the Mandarin lioad north of this station, 
some 3 or 4 versts east of the railway line. 

Febmary 27th. — The detachment which was in the rear 
guard, upon reaching the river Fankhe, found at the crossing 
troops, trains, and artillery which assembled here, and new pas- 
sages had again to be. made. The sapper battalion, which was 
here quite accidentally, worked; most energetically. The crossing 
was quickly effected. 

General Kaulbars moved slowly to the north with the rear- 
guard, unmolested by the enemy. 

February 2Stli. — The rear guard occupied a position on the 
river Fanklie. The troops of the First Aruiy occupied the posi- 
tions on the left flank; General Mischenko, who had not yet 
recovered from his wound, took the command of liis detachment 
and occupied tlie right fiank. 

March 1st. — The enemy began to advance against Fankhe, 
but was repulsed with great losses. Our troops took the offensive 
9nd began to press upon him, walking over hundreds of hostile 
corpses. Our further advance was checked by reinforcements 
which reached the enemy. Slowly and in excellent order our 
troops began to retreat towards Telin. 

In the night of the 25th our troops began to approach Telin. 
They neared it in groups, wherein the men of various units were 



42 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

mixed up., combatants as well as non-combatants, and occupied 
the valley. As they arrived without officers, they could not get 
provisions. I do not understand why it was supposed that, since 
the men had arrived ail in a jumble, ihcy could be left hungry. 
This circumstance was greatly the cause of disorders at Telin. 
It brought about marauding and robbing of stores. However, 
the disorders were, not on a grand scale and were soon quenched, 
although several soldiers were shot down by their officers for 
disobedience. Some of the men, feeling guilty, proceeded further 
to the north, taking along with them many absolutely innocent 
ones. The minds of the soldiers were in an excited condition 
and they could not clearly define the reason why and whereto they 
were going. Having left their units, they remained without food 
and hunger forced them to get it by violence. It is possible that 
kSome of them took other things in addition to provisions, but 
these, as a useless burden, were soon cast aside. Those that 
had gone north of Telin aggregated not more than 3,000 to 
4,000 men. 

The chiefs at last began to evolve order out of this mixed- 
up mass of wandering soldiers and distribute them among their 
original units. There were in all about 20,000 of them. By the 
1st of March there was not a soul at Telin, and even the rail- 
way depot was deserted. All was cleared and the troops were 
located where they belonged. Of course it can not be said that 
order was entirely restored. It is far easier to break it than to 
reestablish it. Many da3's passed before everything could be 
brought to its normal condition, so much the more as it had to 
be done while continuing to retreat. 

I was convinced by my conversations with several general g 
that order could be restored very rapidly by taking the offensive. 
'This would so startle the enemy that he would be sure to retrace 
his steps. Our troops were undoubtedly capable of taking the 
offensive, but, alas! there was a lack of ammunition, especially 
of artillery projectiles. 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 43 

Under such conditions it was impossible to remain in the 
Telin positions, and our troops retreated further to the north, 
halting at the positions situated in the vicinity of the station 
of Sipingay, some 174 versts distant from Mukden and 332 from 
Kharbin. 

Wliat did the :Mukden disaster, screamed about in the foreign 
press and commented on in our own, consist in ? ^ It is true that 
morally we suffered defeat. We lost our prestige in the eyes of 
the Chinese and the nations, who desire to see a disaster in our 
imost insignificant non-success, magnifying it until it reached 
the dimen'sions of a catastrophe, so as to find a momentary con- 
solation in the fact; we have lost our prestige in the eyes of our 
weak-souled friends and also in the eyes of our still more weak- 
souled citizens, who do not wish and, may be, do not know how 
to see clearly into the existing condition of afi'airs, as our Gov- 
ernment spheres take generally little care to acquaint the public 
with it, and in this case did not lift a linger to help it to find 
out the truth. This contempt of public opinion is not timely, 
as it is exploited extensively for their own purposes by all who 
need it. We have suffered smaller losses in men than our victors. 
The loss of some 30 tol 40 guns, several wagons, and from three 
to four milllions' worth of stores is not so great a thing as to 
call it a disaster. 

It is true that we could not take advantage of the Telin posi- 
tions, deemed by specialists far stronger than those we occupied 
on the Shakhe. But from a strategic point of view I do not think 
that we have lost much. Our present situation is better than 
the one before Mukden. Our right flanlv is open (an uninhabited 
desert extends in front of it), so that we can see every movement 
of the enemy and can calculate his strength more accurately than 
at Mukden, in the numerous villages surrounded by clay walls. 
The left flank is in a mountainous region, easily defended with 
a comparatively small force. The thinned ranks have been filled 
again and there remains a surplus for further casualties, 



44 TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

All the rumors concerning our disaster emanated from pre- 
judiced accounts of our mode of retreat. A painful incident 
which took place in the train served as a basis for these accounts. 
Such a prejudiced view acted upon the already nervous public 
and engendered an exaggerated pessimistic feeling. Such was 
this painful episode. 



CHA.PTE11 VII. 

THE PAiVIC IN THE TEATN. 

General Kuropatkin, as I have already said, left on Febru- 
ary 34tli for the northern front, for the purpose of directing th- 
operations in person. It was already felt at that time that the 
moment to give a decisive blow to the enemy had passed, and 
that nothing was left but to prepare for retreat and. use all means 
to maintain order during that retreat. It is said that for that 
purpose the Commander-in-chief ordered on the morning of Feb- 
ruary .24th one of his immediate assistants to begin sending the 
trains to the north, the train of the Commander-in-chief, of the 
Staff, and of the quartermaster to start first. (According to the 
rule, this train must always be at a distance of one day's march 
from the headquarters. In this case this rule was not observed.) 
But as soon as the Commander-in-chief had left, this assistant's 
young wife came to see him, their interviews talving place at 
rare intervals, as, according to General Kuropatkin's orders, the 
presence of his subordinate officers' wives was absolutely forbid- 
den, even for a short time, in his train and in the train of his 
chief of Staif. Abnormal, unnatural sensations have a pleasant 
effect upon the nerves of the mentally distorted twentieth- 
century man. It may be that in the case under consideration the 
interview with his wife within the sound of the roar of guns and 
the moans of thousands of the best sons of his country, falling un- 
der the enemy's blows, at the moment when the fate of the war 
was being decided, produced some special sensation, awakening 
extraordinary ecstasies and making him forget his duty. ' By gome 
accident the train in which he was had no telephone connection 
in that critical moment. Only towards evening did the news 
arrive Teporting the breaking through of our center by the Jap- 

45 



45 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

anese, threatening the occupation of Mukden station from min- 
ute to minute, and only at 8 p. m. were orders given for the train 
to retreat to the north hy the great Mandarin Eoad. The train 
of the Commander-in-chief and of the quartermaster started after 
11 p. m. on February 24;th, when at that time they ought to 
have been near Tehn, and these Avere those that siiU'cred most. 

In order to get to the Mandarin Koad, by whicli the trains 
Jiad to retreat, it was necessary to traverse Mukden or to make 
a circuit of some 13 versts. To traverse Mukden, especially in 
the night, was impossible. Thus the train started. It is diffi- 
cult to conceive how enormous this train was in dimensions and 
how fearful in unwieldiness. It extended for about 60 to 70 
versts in one continuous ribbon of several rows. Artillery and 
artillery parks were added to it, as the artillery was not to take 
part in rear-giuard battles; carts loaded with the property of the 
Chinese Bank and its employees and of private citizens who left 
with the officials came likewise along. The presence of these ele- 
ments, foreign to the troops, in no way contributed to the main- 
tenance of order on the march. AVhenever one cart stopped, the 
whole caravan was arrested; some time elapsed before the cart 
■was put in motion, those in the rear, especially the artillery, 
which admits of no obstacles, pressed on, and the disorder 
increased. 

Only at dawn of day did the head of the train emerge on the 
Mandarin Eoad. As the train advanced various non-combatant 
units joined it, as bakers, Intendancy detachments, and others. 
In some of the units the wagons looked like those loads which 
the inhabitants of the capital see when moving to and from the 
country: tables, stools, various household chattels, all that the 
thrifty striker did not wish to leave behind so as not to deprive 
his officer of comifort, possible in the field, was piled in these 
wagons. When the main part of the train Avas between Tava 
and Puldie, there appeared on the summit of one of the hills sev- 
eral hostile mountain guns and, ma^be. 3, sc[uadroc or two of 



TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 47 

cavalry, evidently part of the troops which broke through our 
ranks near Kiuzan, and, coming np to this point, opened fire 
against the retreating train. The shrapnel screeched and the 
grenades hissed. One of these sliimosas fell and exploded in the 
midst of the train, overthroAving several carts and killing and 
Hvonnding several men and horses; there again a shrapnel burst, 
killing several men and beasts. The horses went mad and kicked 
and reared, the wagons crowded upon each other and turned 
over, cries and moans were heard, and the confusion was inde- 
scribable. Each and every one endeavored to get out of the dan- 
ger zone, and the general chaos and disorder increased. The non- 
combatant units, absolutely devoid of initiative, without leader- 
ship, were incapable of doing anything, and the disorder was in- 
creased by the presence of foreign elements, such as Chinese driv- 
ers with their arbas and wagons. All these were screaming and 
crazily rushing to and fro, while the shrapnel continued to burst 
overhead, and the sliimosas continually fell to the ground, vomit- 
ing columns of black, stifling smoke. The train servants, unaccus- 
tomed to fire, lost their heads, and in their fear looked for safety 
vrherever they could. Some of them rushed into the fields and 
madly jumped over the rows of ghiaolan; some were wedged in the 
lines of the train, and endeavored to unharness a horse, so as to 
flee likewise into the fields. The gunners and men of the artiller}' 
parks, though they all had already seen fights, influenced by the 
general panic, followed their example; the parks aud guns were 
abandoned, and sometimes a gun, pulled out of the line, was 
careering at full gallop, overturning everything which lay in its 
Avay. rortunately, the hostile fire was soon exhausted (it was 
found out later that there was an insufilcient number of pro- 
jectiles) and comparative order was gradually restored. How- 
ever, it was impossible to gather up the abandoned property, for 
the men who had unharnessed the horses had galloped far away. 
It is not knoAvn where Colonel Timofeyeff, of the General 

Staff, came from. Seeing the insignificance of the enemy's forces, 
4— 



48 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



and thinking that it would be easy to capture even his guns, 
hvi&hing in general to restore order, especially necessary in case 
of a repetition of a sudden attack, he rode up to some units and 
endeavored to stop them. The men were all in sheepskin over- 
coats, and it was difficult to make out if they were combatants or 
aion-combatants, so much the more as the latter likewise wore 
arms, though these were only a useless burden to tlicm. ^[otwitli- 
standing all his efforts, his remonstrances had no effect. lie 
then drew his revolver and made two shots, probably against 
those who answered him most impudently. They fell and their 
comrades lired at the Colonel. Hit by several bullets, he fell 
severely wounded. The men fled and every trace of them dis- 
appeared, prohably forever. , Justice will surely not find them, 
and what sense would there be in punishing them ? Eemorse, 
which each of them must have felt as soon as the first fits of 
panic had left them, will be a heavy enough burden for them to 
carry. 

At the time that all fiew, seized by unconscious fear, 
that one cart overturned the other, that one man trampled the 
other under foot, thinking only of his own salvation, one strange 
vehicle arrested the eye. Drawn by one horse, a soldier sitting 
on the box, it advanced evenly, slowly, as if no fearful confusion 
and disorder reigned around it, as if notiiing of what was going 
on mattered at all. A gun, drawn by six horses, came rushing 
on furiously, and it seemed tliat one moment more and it would 
reach the vehicle and smash it like so many others; but, when 
only at a few paces from that vehicle, the six frenzied horses 
swerved suddenly to the side, skillfully 2>assing it, and rushed 
furiously on. 

What vehicle was it? AVhy was ever3^one afraid to come 
upon it? The soldier, dazed by grief, carried in this vehicle his 
jcompany commander, dearly loved by his entire command. It 
was an exemplary officer, a chief loving his men and taking excel- 
lent care of them, standing up for their interests. The entire 



TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 49 

company simply Avorshiped him. He died a hero's death on the 
field of battle, and his faithful strilcer, who always took aa tender 
care of him as a nurse, was carrying his body along. His entire 
love and devotion was now transferred to his commander's wife, 
who was traveling with him (m that same vehicle. From time to 
time he turned round and gazed with sorrowful, pitying eyes 
into her distracted face. With dishevelled hair, eyes filled with 
terror, this young, pretty woman was looking at the corpse of the 
dearly loved husband who represented to her all the joy of life. 
She, probably, did no more understand the drama taking place 
around the beloved man, did not comprehend whereto and why 
he was being taken. The striker was looking at her and big 
tears were running fa^t over his dusty face, leaving dirty furrows 
behind, which the fine dust that pervaded the air covered again 
\vith. a new -thick layer. 

Tormented by some sort of foreboding, the unhappy woman 
proceeded to the positions on that fatal night. She found with 
dilficulty her husband's company, and began questioning the sol- 
diers. Silence answered her. A fearful thought struck her like 
lightning, and she broke into a fearful, terror-striking laugh, 
which soon changed into sobs. The whole compa,ny then broke 
into sobs. "Come, lady dear,'^ begged the striker, tears rolling 
down his face, and both went to the field of battle. The pale 
dawn was feebly lighting the theater of the dreadful fight. The 
field was covered with corpses; one was lying with outstretched 
hands as if endeavoring to catch soniebod}^ another seemed to 
sleep quietly lying on his back stretched out to his full length, 
while a third one was sitting on his knees with his head bowed 
to the ground. What attitudes do not they take, these unhappy 
people, smitten by sudden death ! Here and there were heard 
the moans of the wounded who had not been picked up through 
the night. The poor woman regained consciousness and hope 
was kindled anew in her heart. "He may be here wounded,'^ 
she says to the striker, but the striker is silent; he knows that 



5Q THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

his commander fell stricken unto death, and that his corpse, taken 
aside by the soldiers, is near at hand. Obeying an unconscious 
impulse, the poor woman walked briskly to the fatal spot. There 
he lies as in life — only a small spot mars his forehead and a drop 
(of coagulated blood stains its whiteness ; he lies on his back, with 
one arm stretched out. She fell on the loved, lifeless form. Her 
head lay on his outstretched arm, and it seemed that they were 
both resting in quiet slumber. Silently did the striker stand, 
moved unto the depths of his soul by this spectacle. But she 
came back from her swoon, and in her despair began to shake her 
husband^s body, as if to waken him from this fearful sleep. 

AVlien the soldiers had placed the body in the vehicle, noth- 
ing could induce her to leave it, and the striker was taking them 
both now to the north, to their country, without any thought as 
to when their journey would come to an end. 

Would it not have been better for this unhappy woman to 
have stayed at home than to witness all these horrors of the war ? 
Of what help could she be to her husband? Seeing all these 
terrors before her, she uselessly deranged her mind, and it may 
be that during her whole life she will not be able to rid herself 
of this morbid condition. 

Order was at last more or less restored, and the train pro- 
ceeded onward. The greater part of the abandoned guns were 
taken along, but some of them had fallen into ravines in the 
confusion, and it was an utter impossibility to pull them out. 
It was likewise necessary to abandon part of the vehicles, as no 
horses could be found to take the place of the killed ones and of 
those that had galloped away. But, in order that the effects 
should not be lost, the soldiers began to open the trunks and 
take all that it was possible to carry to the other vehicles. All 
that could not be carried along was thrown on the road. The 
whole area occupied by the train looked as if some catastrophe 
had taken place : it was strewn with linen, various articles, paper, 
broken and overturned carts, 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 51 

Along each side of the railway were retreating troops which 
had not taken part in the rear-guard fights. Telin was desig- 
nated as the assembling-point. The men, dirty, dusty, their fur 
caps covered with gray cloth, so as not to be conspicuous in bat- 
tle;, and looking like monks' cowls, had a weary, unprepossessing 
aspect. They marched along with their officers in good order, 
and had 50 versts more to walk. They w^ere looking with envy 
at the trains, carrying the wounded, which passed them by. But 
some of the bolder ones at the sidings, where the trains stop, 
jumped on to tlie platforms of the cars; they were followed by 
others, and soon all the platforms, the roofs of the cars, the 
footboards, the tenders, and even the locomotives were covered 
with men. The officers called to them, trying to stop them, but 
seeing that it was of no avail, dismissed them with a wave of 
their hands. The railway personnel treated likewise with great 
indulgence these unexpected passengers, fully comprehending 
what fatigue meant, and the trains proceeded on their way slowly, 
so as not to make any of the soldiers, hanging on to it m all kinds 
-of ways, fall oS.. 

The trains followed each other in a continuous chain and 
were in a like way covered with soldiers. The units were broken. 
The soldiers were separated from their officers. The ranks of the 
remaining ones were also broken and the retreat was continued 
in disorder. 

In the evening of February 28th I went with Colonel Obole- 
sheff, the Engineer officer Mikliaylovski, one of the surgeons, and 
^'the granddaddy of General Mischenko,'^ the Montenegrin Plam- 
enatz, to gather up the wounded along the line. The platform 
of the Santayzy station was covered with wounded, some of which 
had not yet been attended to. One of the flying detachments (the 
St. Petersburg one, I believe) began to dress the wounds at the 
station, and we carried the wounded into the cars which had 
come with us. 

The sun had set and night was advancing fast. In the field, 



52 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



oiot far from the station, noises were heard — talking and the 
neighing of horses ; it was the train which had halted for a rest. 
Vehicles, parks, guns, and trains wdth A>'ounded and men, cover- 
ing the platforms and roofs of the cars, continued to arrive. A 
volley was fired somewhere. Cries were beard : ^'The Japanese ! 
the Japanese cavalry I" Everything w^as confusion. The cries of 
the people intermingled with the neighs of horses and the rattle 
of overturned vehicles, rifle hre opened on all sides. Everyone who 
had a rifle fired without heed of the target. ]\Ioans, the howl- 
ing of thousands of men, the patter of rille fire w^as heard on 
all sides. The commandant, who had evidently received orders, 
in case of the arrival of the Japanese, to burn the stores, think- 
ing that the enemy was close, ordered to set them on fire, and 
feoon an enormous conflagration illuminated the awful spectacle 
of death met at the hands of our own brother soldiers. Past the 
platform rushed the artillery, overturning everything in its 
course; men, horses, all fled panic-stricken. 

Two or three bolder ones stood up on the platform, trying 
to arrest the fugitives. "Stop! stop! there are no Japanese.,'' 
The men, stopping for a moment, but disbelieving the communi- 
cation, rushed on still more rapidly, while bullets were hurtling 
b}^, striking the w^alls of the station, and here and tbere the moans 
of the wounded were heard. 

At last the rifle hre began to slacken, and gradually every- 
thing grew quiet. Many left the station buildings w^ith shamed 
faces. 

"I am the chief of defense of this station," screamed a 
colonel, who had come up from I know not where. 

On that night General Kuropatkin slept in a freight car at 
that station. During the few days that I had not seen him, he 
bad greatly changed and grown pale, while his eyes shone fever- 
. -hly bright. 

It is difficult, of course, to justify such a disorderly retreat, 
but too much severity ought not to be shown these men. Con- 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 53 

sider their mental condition, analyze their psychology, and you 
will understand much that seems incomprehensible. Eemember 
that these are the same men who yesterday and the day before 
repulsed the attacks of the enemy with such courage, such won- 
derful steadfastness, and stormed the hostile fortifications. They 
fought twelye days consecutivel}', inflicting enormous losses on 
the enemy. For twelve days they bore courageously hunger and 
cold (for in battle it is difficult to supply all the units), and not 
a word of murmur ran through the ranks. Each unit did its 
duty, not knowing the general trend of the operation, seeing only 
tli^ results obtained by itself. Each of them had to its account 
a series of heroically repulsed attacks. And suddenly in the 
very heat of battle the order to retreat reaches the positions, a 
painful order, oft repeated during the course ol this war. All 
TBcalled ther recent incident with General Grippenberg, his depart- 
ure, seemingly for the reason that the Commander-in-chief had 
ordered to retreat wJien it was necessary to contimie the fight in 
order to vanquish the enemy, and rumors as to Iris reception in 
St. Petersburg. "The chiefs are quarrelling, and A\e must perish 
on account of their quarrels. Are we food- for the guns?'- Such 
were the words heard among the troops. Is it miicli to be avou- 
dered at that under such conditions the men did not understand 
the order, that murmurs were heard, that faith in their chief 
was shaken, and that the discipline grew slack? The results aie 
evident. But who has to bear the respousil)ility ? 

'Not all the units reached the ]\[an(larin Road, by which the 
retreat was to l)e eltected: some were caught by the enemy, and 
retreated fighting where they could break through, over the moun- 
tainous region east of the railway line, and reached late their 
destination ; many Avere taken prisoner, mostly the Avounded ones. 
At the evacuation of Mukden, the soldiers Avere alloAved to take 
from the stores provisions and other articles; for example, pres- 
ents sent from Eussia. But, unfortunately, some of the soldiers 



54 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



fell upon spirits, became drunk, and lay down on the spot, incapa- 
ble of moving; it is said that of such from 2,000 to 3,000 were 
taken prisoner. 

The further retreat of our troops was effected in good order, 
slowly, without confusion, wdth small rear-gTiard lights of no con- 
sequence whatever. 



Chapter VIII. 
CHANGE OF COMMANDER-m-CHIEF. 

On March 4th General Knropatkin surrendered to General 
Linevich the command of all the land and naval forces operat- 
ing against Japan, and left. The recall of Kuropatkin did not 
•surprise anyone: everybody felt that there must be a change ot 
Commander-in-chief, but no one knew by whom he would be 
replaced, and everybody expected the new chief with great 
anxiety. The appointment of Linevich, well acquainted witn the 
troops and the mode of fighting of the Japanese, gave new cour- 
age to the Army and was received by all with great enthusiasm. 
Everybody knew that he was a courageous, resolute general and 
everybody was sure that he would be able to compel everyone to 
obedience. 

Some persons assert that he is not a remarkable strategist. 
I know nothing about this; it may be that it is. so and it may be 
not. There is no doubt, however, that he is a man endowed with 
the divine sparh and much can be achieved by this. It may be 
that the "deep thinking^'' by which our strategists distinguish 
themselves is not at all necessary; it may be that simple actions 
inspired by that divine spark, are all that is needed, that is indis- 
pensable with the present remarkably developed military tech- 
nique. The future will show who was right. All the disposi- 
tions taken by Linevich, as the Commander-in-chief of the 
armies, during the last days of my sojourn on the theater of 
war, were highly rational and communicated in a decisive tone, 
admitting of no controversies. This means a great deal and tes- 
tifies to the mode of action adopted by tlie Commander-in-chief. 
May the Lord give him strength and health and may the divine 
spark, that will lead us to victory, perhaps, shine on undimmed 1 

55 



5g THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

Only by reason of the iron will of the Commander-in-chier 
was it possible to restore order so rapidly in the troops. 

Some three days later, I believe, it was made known that 
General Kuropatkin had been appointed commander of the First 
Manchnrian Army, and that this appointment had been made 
according to his personal request laid before the Emperor. This 
fact made a very good impression npon the iirmy. I was pres- 
ent when General Kuropatkin rejDorted to General Linevich as a 
subordinate. Vfith his hand at his visor, General Kuropatkin 
reported his arrival. General Linevich, likewise at military salute, 
listened with a concentrated expression on his face to the report 
of his former chief and now his subordinate. Tlie two generals 
immediately entered upon their new roles. How fate sometimes 
plays Avith the destinies of man I 



Chapter IX. 

OPERATIONS OX THE LEFT ELAXK AND IN 
THE CENTEE. 

I have reported consecutiveh'^ according" to the days of their 
taking place^ the operations of onr troops in the vicinity of Muk- 
den — i. e., on the fronts west and north of this cit}', without men- 
tioning a word about the actions on the southern fronts — in the 
center and on the left flank. 1 did this for the purpose of giving 
tlie reader a general uninterrupted impression of the events 
which took place near Mukden, where the Eebruary drama was 
enacted, and which had such decisive inflnence upon the first 
period of the present campaign. 

On the extreme left flank there operated the detachments of 
]\fandrikin; further to the east, the troops of the Generals ]\[as- 
loft, Eennenkampf, Alexiefl, and Danilof!; further still were 
the Siberian Corps. The forces of the enemy were very large 
and he began to press upon us. 

It was already known by Febrnary Stli that the Japanese 
intended to take tiie olfensi^e. The extreme advanced detach- 
ments of the enemy began to operate against our extreme left 
flank — the Tsynkhenchen detachment. During tlie two follow- 
ing days the advance grew more intense, wliile on the 11th and 
12th of February the attacks were made with forces greatly supe- 
rior in numbers to tlie Russians, and, notwithstanding our stuljborn 
resistance and the great losses of the enemy, avc were forced to 
retreat to our positions. Our troops left with great unwilling- 
ness the fortified points; the attacks ended in bayonet fights, the 
enemy retreated repeatedly, leaving hundreds of corpses behind, 
but again reinforced, rushed on anew. It was necessary to ex- 
pel the officers by force from the occupied positions. On the 

67 



58 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



13tli and 14tli of February the Japanese made a stubborn attack 
against the entire front of our left fiank. After fierce fighting, 
our troops left the positions of Dalin Pass. The results of the 
last days were such, in general, that, having left our former posi- 
tions, we straightened out our front, pushing our left flank far 
to the south. The taking of Dalin Pass by the Japanese opened 
for them, so to say, the road to Fushun. and Telin. But the army 
'of Linevich, which had taken firm hold of this region, did not 
allow them to take one step forward. 

Attacks and artillery fights took place daily in the center, 
but the result was always the same: they were all repulsed by 
us with enormous losses to the enemy. The Poutiloff and Nov- 
gorod Hills were fired at uninterruptedly from 11-inch guns. 
The valises, as the soldiers call the 11-inch projectiles, cut 
through the air with a fearful noise and their fragments, in the 
form of shapeless objects, produced a specially disagreeable hiss- 
ing sound. These noises had a very exciting eftect upon the 
!Qerves, precluding the possibility of ever getting used to them, 
forcing the men to be ever on the watch, and the soldiers had 
so well adapted themselves to the flight of these projectiles that 
the loss among them was insignificant. The fortifications, how- 
ever, suffered greatly. On the loth, 16th, and 17th the Japanese 
endeavored to break through our lines at any cost and at any 
point; all their efforts, however, were frustrated; though we too 
had to pay with an enormo,us number of victims, the enemy's 
losses were still greater. The hostile guard, counting 20,000 
men, attacked the corps of General Zasulich, but all the attacks 
were repulsed. Thirteen attacks made within two days cost the 
enemy almost two-thirds of his contingent. General Zasulich here 
succeeded in taking his revenge upon the guard which defeated 
him under Turenchen. 

It may be said that the Japanese understood already on the 
18th-19th of February that they would not succeed in breaking 
through the line on the left flank and dislodge General Line- 



TEE TRUTH ABOUT TEE WAR. 59 

vich's army, defending itself with such eaitraordinary stubboxn- 
ness. The losses of the enemy were here so great that his army 
melted, so to say, before our eyes. Considering this affair as 
lost, the Japanese rushed first against the front, but at this point 
too all their efforts broke against the solidity of our defenders. 
Then they went further and fell upon our right; flank. 

On February 23d the army of General LineAdeh left the posi- 
tions which it had defended with such obstinacy against the fierce 
onrush of the enemy. The losses on both sides amounted to from 
50,000 to 60,000 (we lost, as the defensie, about 21,000). On 
the 24th it occupied new positions on the Khunkhe Eiver, but 
already on the 25th moved further to the north in the direction 
of Telin. 

The retreat of this army took place in excellent order; it 
left not a vehicle nor a rifle as booty to the enemy, although here 
too some of the wagons looked like carts moving household goods 
to the country. It was told that General Eennenkampf, having 
halted, had a fire built and allowed the train to pass by him. One 
vehicle stopped ; the tired horse was incapable' of pulling it over the 
pass; the driver, not less fatigued than the animal, exerted all 
his strength to help it, but this did not improve matters. The 
vehicle, filled with all kinds of household articles, was exceed- 
ingly heavy. 

^'Whose things are these ?" asked Eennenkampf of the driver. 

^The company commander's, your excellency,^' answered he. 

^'^Well, my friend, throw^ them into that fire.'" 

The soldier looked with incredulity at the General. "How is 
it possible to throw the property of the company commander into 
the fire ?" thinks he. How much pains had not he and the striker 
*taken to gather it up and bring it to this point, not desiring to 
leave anything to the Japanese. 

"That's all right, brother; throw "them in. I will answer 
for them." 



60 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



The goods are thrown into the fire and the horse goes on 
easil}^ ]^ot a few of sucli vehicles met with the same fate. 

It could he gathered from the actions of the Commander- 
in-chief that he supposed as early as February 17th that the 
blow would be struck against the left flank and that the turn- 
ing movement of the enemy and his operations on the right 
flank were nothing but a big demonstration, as it would be impos- 
sible to explain otherwise the sending of the 1st Siberian Army 
Corps with one brigade to the left flank at the time when the turn- 
ing colunm had not only Ijeen sighted, but haxl come in touch 
with our armies. It is evident that he feared that the Japanese, 
having taken possession of Dalin Pass and others and having 
here driven out our troops, would move against Fushun and fur- 
ther against Telin so as to take us in the rear. It is probable that 
such a plan existed among the Japanese, but the events which 
took place against their Avishes forced them to adapt" themselves 
to the circumstances aceordingt to their development: they 
altered their plan according to the course of events. It is pos- 
sible that future events forced them to strike their principal blow, 
instead of the left flank against the right and end the operations 
at Mukden, perhaps with not so signal a success as when they 
could have executed their movement against Fushun-Telin. It 
is evident that it is drfacult to tell now what tlie enemy proposed 
to do. This will be seen after the war if the Japanese are sin- 
cere. At the present time we must limit oin^selves to probable sup- 
positions, so much the more as it is impossible to credit informa- 
tion from Tokyo even concerning events which have taken place 
long ago, as it is less than probable that the Japanese would like 
to disclose to everybody their tactics and mode of fighting. 

I repeat that it might be possible that the Japanese intended 
to overthrow General Linevich and advance further turning our 
two other armies. If this was, however, a. demonstration, as sup- 
posed by some, it was such a powerful one that had it not met 
^vith such stubborn resistance from General Linevich's army, it 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE ^VAR. 61 

would have attained results which would have exceeded the prob- 
lems of any denionstrataon^ however large it might be. Such 
conclusion is brought about by the fact that on the left flank and 
in the center up to Februciry 19th and yOth, the Japanese made 
stubborn attacks with large forces, while at that time their suc- 
cess w^as doubtful on the right flank; only after February 20th 
did their attacks on this point grow weaker — it was evident that 
they had transferred some of their forces against our right flank, 
thus giving General Linevich the possibility of taking the offens- 
ive himself. It is possible that the Japanese, seeing the impos- 
sibility- of executing successfully the plan of operations drawn 
up by them east of Mukden, had shifted their decisive actions 
Avest of Mukden, seeing that our right Hank was the weaker of 
the two. 



Chapter X. 

SHORT SYJN'OPSIS OF THE MUKDEN OPERATIONS. 

Making a resume of the course of events, Ave see that on 
February 11th the Japanese had conoentratecl all their efforts 
for the purpose of overthrowiing the left flank of General Line- 
army, making fierce attacks at the same time against his right 
flank, so as to make it impossible for him to reinforce his 
left flank. They attacked just as stubbornly our right flank, 
and sent out a detachment along the Liaokhe valley for the pur- 
pose of turning us from the west. All these operations were 
planned either for the purpose of impeding us from sending re- 
inforcements to the left flank over which they might, had their 
operations at this point been successful, have marched on Fushun 
and further in a turning movement from the east, leaving a 
strong garrison at Fushun, or as a big demonstration oiu the left 
flank for the purpose of keeping us from sending reinforcements 
to the right flank. But the stubborn resistance of General Line- 
vich's army and the great losses incurred by the Japanese (Gen- 
eral Linevich's losses amounted to 21,000, while the Japanese, as 
the attacking pa,rty, lost probably near our fortifications at least 
30,000 and maybe 40,000 men) altered here the correlation of 
forces, which was not in favor of the Japanese, and thus forced 
them to try to strike a blow in the west. On February 19th they 
began their energetic advance in that direction. Our passive 
actions on the 19 th and 20th of February gave us the possibility 
of concentrating here quite considerable forces. Supposing the 
numlerical correlation of the two armies to be expressed by the 
following figures^ — the Japanese 400,000 and ours 350,000, then 
on February 11th these forces were distributed as follows: 
The Japanese — the turning column, 50,000; the right flank, 

62 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 63 

120,000; the center, 70,000; the left flank, 120,000; the re- 
serves, 40,000. Our troops^the right flank, 120,000; the left 
flank, 110,000; the center, 80,000; and the reserves, 40,000. On 
February 17th we had on the right flank 100,000, ini the center 
70,000, on the left flank 140,000, and in the reserves 40,000. 
Between the 20th and 23d of February our left flank was again 
weakened to 70,000, the center likewise, while the right flank had 
been reinforced. But at that time the Japanese had likewise 
concentrated here about 240,000, so that they had on their left 
flank and in their center about 120,000, and maybe still less. 
Thus on the western front the enemy had a numerical superior- 
ity over us. These figures, of course, are quite problematic, but 
their correlation is approximately correct. 

On the 19th, 20th, 21st, and 22d of February the Japanese 
strained all efforts to throw backward the Third Arm}^, occupying 
the left bank of the Khunkhe, and break tlirough its lines in the 
rayon oi Madiapoo-Youkhuntun, but all their attempts remained 
unsuccessful and they lost a greait number of men. It is not an 
exaggerated statement that they lost about 20,000 men in those 
days. Seeing that their etlorts did not succeed at that point, 
they advanced and strengthened their front north o<f Mukden, 
in the rayon of the InijDerial Tombs. They met with some suc- 
cess here in the beginning (we had somewhat retreated), but 
the reinforcements received by us forced them to stop and to go 
back. Then they advanced still further for the purpose of turn- 
ing us from the north. In order to strengthen our troops on the 
right bank of the IGiunklie, we had to shorten our line of front, 
for which purpose our troops, occupying the positions east of 
Sakhepoo and Sakhepoo-Madiapoo, were drawn in the night of 
February 23d to the positions along the right bank of the 
Khunkhe. The divisions of Artamonofl; and Herschelmann were 
transferred north of the Imperial Tombs opposite Tsuertnn, 
for the purpose of arresting at this point, under command of 
General Mylofi, tlie advance of the Japanese towards the railway 

5— 



64 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



line, as they had succeeded in approaching it to within a distance 
of from 3 to 4 versts. 

A hurricane raged on February 24th. On that day oui 
troops succeeded in somewhat throwing the Japanese from the 
railway line, opposite Tsuertun. But, taking advantage of the 
lliurricane, which had raised whole clouds of dust, especially 
thick on the right bank of the Khunkhe on account of sandbanks 
consisting of the fmcst sand, and likewise of the fact that our 
troops did not occupy, as was proposed in the disposition, their 
positions, and( that there' was no' proper mamtenance of com- 
munications between the 3d and 4th Corps,* the Japanese broke 
through into our positions at Kiuzan. As this was done by small 
forces, it could always have been paralyzed and would not have 
been of any essential importance. At the same time the enemy, 
having been incapable of breaking through the lines near the 
Imperial Tombs and Tsuertun, sent out another column towards 
the north and occupied a village, situated on the same parallel 
as the Khushitay station, 10 versts west of this point — in other 
words, advanced more to the north than our troops in position 
near Tsuertun. 

Thus, as in previous instances, we were forced to again extend 
our fronts reduced the day before, tO' almo^st exactly the same 
dimensions. We were following the movements of the enemy all 
the time, subordinate to his actions, and never once did we take 
the initiative, never once did we try to execute some independent 
maneuver. Did Kuropatkin have sufficient forces to extend his 
front, and were tlie tired toops capable of executing rapidly and 
isuccessfiiUy such a maneuver ? I believe that it would have been 
possible if we take into consideration that the losses of the Jap- 
anese were greatly superior to ours and tlmt they were not less 
fatigued than we, also that for this operation there could have 
heen taken part of the troops of the Third Army and some of 

*There were only 10 battalions left in the 4th Corps, and they had to occupy 
a front almost 10 versts in extension. 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 65 

General Lmevich'y army. It is evident that tlie Commander-in- 
chief did not share this view, as in the night of February 24th- 
25th he gave tlie order to retreat on T'elin. 

I cannot agree with the opinion of some persons, among 
others that of Colonel Ladygensld, correspondent of the Novoe 
Vremia, former correspondent of the Russho& Slovo, that it 
would have been better to allow one's self to be surrounded than 
to retreat, for the surrounded army could have held out until 
reinforcements from Kharbin could have come to the rescue. I 
cannot agree with this opuiion, because I did not think such 
prompt rescue possible. The Japanese might, by detaching, let 
us say, one division from their army, send it unimpeded towards 
Kharbin, and it would have destroyed on its way all our stores, 
our etapes, our railway, our bridges, and our establishments for 
the supply of water. Then our new army, which should have 
come to the rescue of the surrounded one, would have had to make 
a forced march from Kharbin to Mukden — a distance of 500 
versis — without any supplies on the road it would follow. There- 
fore it would have been necessary to prepare aud take along an 
enormous train for the necessary provisioning of the troops. It 
is evident that under such circumstances the rescuing army could 
Jiot have reached its aim before some six weeks or two months. 
V )f the pro^visions left in Mukden there would not have been suffi- 
ilent for the supplying of the three armies for more than some 
ten or fifteen days, while there was a still smaller supply of am- 
munition. The Cliinese population of Mukden, not over friendly 
towards us now, on account of the close proximity of the Jap- 
anese, would not have given us any of their own supplies, while 
requisition, when the Chinese hide carefully all they possess, more 
than once proved ineffective. Once the Commander-in-chief had 
recognized his incapability of extending his front in a northerly 
direction, where the Japanese had sent their troops, there re- 
mained nothing else for him to do but to retreat. How far !he 



66 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



"was right in liis belief is another question. However, I must re- 
mark that this retreait was effected far from the way in which it 
might have been executed. It seems to me tliat there was no 
general plan of retreat, and that everybocl}'' was left to his own 
devices. 

Before coming to the analysis of the causes of our failures 
in general, and dn particular of the operations near Mukden, I 
shall say a few words on the several institutions of our Army. 



Chapter XI. 

THE I^^TE^TDAIs'CY. 

Who knows not of tlie reproaclies made in former wars to 
this institution? Who is ignorant of the rumors of and even 
trials for the abuses made by the employees of this department: — 
abuses that grew into bywords ? I too came to the;' theater of war 
greatly prejudiced against the Intendancy. When in the be- 
ginning I heard the actions of the Intendancy discussed under 
different colors from what my ears had been accustomed to, I 
never answered the sjoeaker^ but thought to myself, ^^In what con- 
nection does this worthy stand to this celebrated establishment ?■ 
But gradually, as I grew more acquainted wih the state of affairs, 
'the local circumsitances, and the conditions of war, my suspicious 
attitude towards the Intendancy disappeared slowly, and I began 
to have a better opinion of this department. It was" gladsome 
'to observe that> in this year of padnful trials falling to the share 
of our country, the sentiment of citizenship had awakened in our 
hardened bureaucracy. The Intendancy question interested me 
not only as an observer, whose duty it is to place before the public 
the results of his observations, but also as a man who desired to 
convince himself that the general progress had also found its way 
into a midst which, so far, had been considered as hopeless. Thus, 
a stranger to everybody, I questioned the contractors, was an ap- 
parently accidental witness to deliveries, saw how the Army was 
provisioned and with what articles, how it was clothed and booted, 
and I must admit that I cannoit make a single complaint against 
this institution. It is true that the Intendancy strove for cheap- 
ness, sometimes manifesting too much zeal in this direction to 
the greater injury of the service. Thus the Intendancy wanted 
to maintain the prices, at any cost, on some articles, as bread, 

67 



68 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



grain, hay, etc. The contractors did not wish to lower their 
prices; the Intendancy, in its turn, refused toi buy at the prices 
demanded, and when, brought to the extremity, it consented, the 
prices rose and the contractors did not agree to sell for what they 
had first asked. Thus the products had to be bought at a higher 
price than could have been done earlier. This testifies to a 
lack of commercial aptitude among the Intendancy employees 
and to the preponderance of red tape over live work. The Chief 
Intendant, General Gniber, is the most honest man living. It 
will be impossible to find a man, even among his bitterest ene- 
mies, to accuse him of lack of integrity. He surrounded himself 
with young, prominent officers, mostly such as had graduated 
from the Intendancy Course of Instruction, likewise honest men 
and conscientious workers. I will not den}*, of course, that there 
was no bad egg in this family and that not always did everything 
go smoothly in this institution. But it is gladsome to see that 
abuse is not the general rule of this establishment, as it had been 
heretofore, there being only a few sad exceptions, a fact that 
may occur anywhere, and especially in such an enormous under- 
taking as that of the Intendancy. 

The Intendancy had no general deliverers — i. e., the pro- 
visions were obtained on an economic plan, from first hands, 
straight from the producers or through secondary contractors. 
The principal contractor was the renowned collaborator of Sko- 
beleff, GromoS, but he operated here more out of love of war 
and patriotism than out of love of gain. 

According to regulations concerning the administration of 
the armies and to the orders of the Commander-in-chief, the 
(preparation of provisions and other supplies was made by each 
army separately, the Commander-in-chief giving only general in- 
dications. The special conditions of the country, the existence 
of only one line of communications (tlie East Siberian Railway) 
hj which products could be brought, the limitation of the rayon 
in which the supplies could be obtained, on account of which, 



TEE TBVTB ABOUT THE WAR. 69 

there being three armies, their ^ntendancies- might compete with 
each other-all this forced to deviate from the established reg- 
ulations and concentrate tire preparation of products and various 
provisions in the hands of one person-namely, in the hands of 
the Chief Intendant, attached to the Cominander-m-chiet. 

The character of the Commander-in-chief played likewise 
a role in the operations of the Intendancy. ^ 

The Chief Intendant placed before the Commander-m-chiei 
for approval his plans for the smaller cost of supplies, the meas- 
tires to be taken for the timely purchase of various provisions, aad 

SO forth. ^ ,_^ -;i -1 on 

For a pood of bean husks for the feeding of cattle was paid 1.20 
roubles, while one pood of beans cost only 40 copecks. The dis- 
cremncy was evident: the remnants of tiie beans, after the oil 
had been extracted, cost more than the beans themselves. The 
exploitation was flagrant. The Chief Intendant proposed to have 
all the beans nnrchased and an oil-extracting plant estabhshed, 
so as to obtain the remnants at a very small cost in this manner. 
4ccording to calcnlations, the price of tlie husks would be so much 
below tliat at which they were bought that it would have been 
of the greatest advantage to use them as fuel instead of wood, 
which was bought at from 60 to 100 roubles per cubic sagen. He 
likewise raised the question of cutting hay in the Mongol steppes 
and many other similar projects were placed by him Wore 
(the Commander-in-chief. Commissions were instituted by the 
Commander-in-chief for the purpose of deliberating upon them, 
refusing to decide himself upon these questions. But who 
ignores what it means to place something in the hands of a com- 
mission? The activity of the latter even here on the theater of 
war was not distinguished by greater energy, and often when the 
commission had passed a resolution, the time for its ex^utiun 
had passed, never to return. 

General Kuropatkin acted this way, evidently, out of pre- 
caution, desiring to avoid blame. But such caution is good in 



70 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

time of peace and not in time of war^ when every minnte is 
precious^ and the fear of blame is still more misplaced in such a 
period. The responsible position of the Commander-in-chief 
waives by itself all possibility of blame for economical meas- 
ures. It is true that Government control was exercised over the 
Commander-in-chief. Thanks to the presence of this institution 
there existed the same red tape, the same routine w^hich, even 
in time of peace, kill every live work. I might point out scores 
and hundred of cases where people were awaiting, in consequence 
of red tape, for weeks the mooiey due them for materials deliv- 
ered by them. This killed in the contractors all desire to have 
anything to do with the Government, and thus the Government 
had to pay oai that account very large sums as compared to what 
it might have paid. Are these the results which the Government 
control desires to obtain? 

There arises then the following anomaly: A man is en- 
trusted with the entire wealth of the country, its honor and its 
future, while over a loss of 5 copecks control is instituted. 



Chapter XII. 

THE SxiNITAEY SERVICE. 

All tlie three armies are in excellent sanitary conditions, 
in the summer after the Liaoyang battle and especially in 
August, dysentery or the epidemic gastro-enteritis, as called by 
the physicians, and typhoid fever appeared in the Army, even in 
quite large proportions. But with the approach of winter the 
disease disappeared almost completely. In general, the percent- 
age of men who fell ill on the theater of Avar was smaller than in 
time of peace. This is explained, on the one hand, by the dry 
climate of Manchuria, where the sun is shining brightly during 
the entire winter; and, on the other hand, by the excellent pro- 
visioning of the Army and the warm clo'thing distributed to the 
soldiers. 

All the medico-sanitary establishments, as the military med- 
ical department^ tlie institutions of the Red Cross, the zemstva 
detachments, and detachments with other denominations, fulfill 
their duties most excellently during the time when there is no 
fighting. But tliis I cannot say about them at the time of battle. 
The military medical department is tlie one deserving of most 
blame, especiaUy its administration. In Mukden, Tclin, Kharbin, 
at every point tliere could bq found a great number of physicians 
pining for want of work. They desired work, but it was impos- 
sible for them to get an appointment. There were, for exam- 
ple, such cases: The medical authorities sent a party of physi- 
cians from Kharhin to Mukden; the local medical authorities 
did not receive tlie surgeons and sent them back to Kliarbin. And 
thus they traveled back and forth — they felt both offended and 
somewhat ashamed. But when large operations began, they were 

71 



72 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

hurriedly assigned to duty^ perhaps at points where they would 
be of but little use or even quite supierHuous ; part of them was 
kept to be detailed to accompany sanitary trains. In the mean- 
while hundreds of wounded were suffering, moaning, dying of 
loss of blood, awaiting their turn to have their wounds dressed; 
so some of them died before this turn came, and maybe, with 
timely aid, part of these might have been saved. I often had 
occasion to see at tbe dressing-stations a mass of wounded lying 
on the ground, an endless chain of them coming up, and still 
others brought, while there were only two surgeons and two to 
three hospital stewards to attend to the work under which they 
staggered. In addition to the dressing of the wounds, it is neces- 
sary to keep a list of the wounded who have been attended to. 
This work is done by the surgeon and the steward in turn. These 
surgeons and stewards are regimental ones, and the authorities 
never thought of sending to their assistance the physicians that 
were idling in the reserves. You see — the military medical 
department is a special establishment, almost a realm in itself. 
A well-applied first dressing of the womid isi of great importance 
in the course of recovery. The dressing-stations are always 
within the sphere of fire, as modern guns and rifles have a very 
long range and the Japanese pay but slight attention tO' the Eed 
Cross flags, often, it is true, entirely ignorant of their where- 
abouts. I stayed once two hours at the dressing-station, entering 
the names, family names, and other data concerning the woundedl 
attended to, allowing during that time the medical p&rson?iel 
to take care of the Avounded. AVhy should not each soldier have on 
jhim a ticket or card bearing all this information? then, instead 
of writing all this down and asking all these questions, the 
cards might be simply taken from them. The surgeons and stew- 
ards working at tlie dressing-stations are above all pradse; our 
hospital stewards are excellent — ^the bandages made by them are 
simply artistic. The same may be said about those working at 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 73 

the hospitals^ where their labor is itu interrupted throughout day 
and night. 

The establishments of the Eed Cross are likewise impos- 
sible to be replaced. The flying detachments of the Eed Cross 
are of great service in the first aid to the w^ounded. Other 
detachments are likewise of great assistance^ but of all those I 
had the occasion to see^ I must give preference to the Eed Cross. 
The following strange fact must be noted with regard to the fly- 
ing detachments — at the time of battles they are obliged to 
choo'se themselves their theater of activity^ and they go where 
tliey believe they will be most needed. This comes from the 
utter impossibility for them to get indications from the military 
medical authorities as to where their pr£;sence would be most use- 
ful. TMs I explain by misplaced rivalry. Wliat shall I say about 
the Sisters of Mercy? This question is a hard one tO' treat; I 
might be taken for a woman-hater^ be accused of prejudice, should! 
I speak unfavorably about them, wdiile should I say nothing but 
good, I w^ould fall short of the truth. It is true that a woman's 
hand has a soothing eifect upon the shattered nerves of the 
wounded; that a woman is an excellent nurse, and that the 
Vounded look trustfully upon the Sisters of Mercy, knowing of 
their sympathetic feeling towards them; that the good done by 
them is invariable; that most of the Sisters are devoted heart 
iand soul to tlieir work. Much has been said and written about 
it and there is no need of adding or detracting anything. But 
there is another side to the question which not everyone will want 
to touch upon. The presence of women at advanced positions has 
negative sides. I will not treat this subject at length; I will say 
but one thing, and tliat is that the Sisters of Mercy ought to be 
kept exclusively at the sanitary medical institutions, established 
in the rear of the Army, and never at the front. I am convinced 
•that as soon as these regulations would be in force, many of the 
Sisters would abandon their new-fangled fad and return to their 
former occupations in their native country, and the institution 



74 TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

of Sisters ot Mercy would only gain and grow healthier through 
this circumstance. One of the Sisters^ who remained at Mukden 
after this city's occupation by the Japanese^ told that when she 
asked the Plenipotentiary of the Japanese Red Cross to give her 
the opportunity of making the acquaintance of the Japanese Sis- 
ters of Merc}^^ he answered her : "At the advanced posts we have 
no other women but prostitutes; our wives^ our Sisters of Mercy 
are far at the rear^ doing their work there." 

In our Army it is just the reverse — the Sisters of Mercy 
are at the front and the prostitutes at the rear. 

Talking about the personnel of the Eed Cross that had re- 
mained at IMukden^ I cannot help noting the following circum- 
stance. There had stayed behind at i\Iukden some 500 of O'ur 
wounded and about 400 Japanese. There were several scores of 
stewards^ some 10 or 15 surgeons, aaid a still greater number of 
Sisters of Mercy left to take care of these 1,000 wounded, and 
witli this personnel likewise refnained Chief Plenipotentiary of 
tlie Red Cross Guchkoif and his assistant, Counlt Olsufyeff. I 
ask. Was it necessary that for these 500 wounded, there should 
remain all this personnel with the Chief •Pleni2>otentiary at its 
liead? In addition to these we had over 60,000 wounded whom 
the Chief Plenipotentiai^y abandoned. I understand that should 
the medical personnel have declined to remain, ]\Ir. Guchkoff's 
act would have been an example to the others (but at all events 
without keeping his assistant Avith him), would have a reason, 
but tliere were so many Avho desired to stay, that there was no 
need of the Cliief Plenipotentiary's setting the example, and it 
was absolutely unnecessary for him to abandon an entire institu- 
tion with several tens of thousands of wounded entrusted to 
his care. 

There are among our Sisters of Mercy many such which 
are here dubbed "margarine Sisters." These are the wives of 
Various members of the Army enrolling as Sisters of Mercy to 
be near their husbands. These Sister-wives, of no use whatever 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 75 

in the work of aiding the wonnded, have a nefarious influence 
on the Arni}^ During lulls in the militar}^ operations the young 
officers pay court to the wives of their chiefs^ the husbands grow 
jealous^ the wives nervous, while tlie officers neglect their duty. 
During battle the wives are anxious about their husbands, the 
husbands about their wives, messengers are sent several times 
a day with no'tes as to health, and it is easily understood, that 
the service does not benefit from all this anxiety and uneasiness. 
In addition to this, the wives have to be taken care of, dwellings 
Inust be found for them, cars on the railway, when everybody is 
suffering from lack of accommodation. This is especially trying 
on account of the continuous movements of the Army. I know 
of cases when the railway personnel was placed in the following 
dilemma : either send several wives of superior officers or a certain 
number of wounded, and in two cases the preference was given to 
the wives. Eemember the already mentioned consequences of the 
train having been sent to Telin IG hours late. I am convinced 
Ithat the presence of the wives of the chiefs at Port Arthur was 
not without its influence upon the premature surrender of this 
fortress. 

It is necessary that the condition of leaving the theater of 
war be placed on the Sisters of Mercy having husbands in the 
ranks, and in general, the wives ought not to be allowed to join 
their husbands, even for a short period. 

Before my departure from St. Petersburg, A. S. Souvorin 
asked me to investigate into the activity of Chief Plenipoten- 
tiary of the Red Cross Alexandrovski. Everybody was talk- 
ing about him at that time, and his actions were mentioned in 
connection with the ceasing of gifts being sent to. the Eed Cross, 
which received such generous contributions in the beginning of 
the war. Unfortunately, at my arrival I did not find Mr. Alex- 
androvski on the spot, and could not discuss the matter with 
him. I always keep to the principle, Audiatur et altera pars. 
From the data which I succeeded in gathering concerning the 



76 TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

sanitary organizations and from their comparison to the expendi- 
tures made by the Eed Cross at the seat of war during Mr. 
Alexandrovsld's administration^ I came to the conclusion that 
no special abuse was current in the lied Cross. It was even quite 
■to the contrary; some expenditures of other saiidtary organiza- 
tions were greatly superior to similar ones made by the Eed 
Cross. For example, the maintenance of the medical personnel, 
with the exception of the stewards, amounted to 1 rouble per 
diem per man, including the morning teai with bread and butter, 
a dinner of two or three courses, the evening tea, a supper of 
one course, and other supplementary expenditures; the mainte- 
nance of the stewards came to 50 copecks per diem. Taking into 
/Consideration the high price of the products existing at present 
in Manchuria, such expenditure is not excessive. The Eed Cross 
hought horses at an average of T'7 to 81 roubles, and mules at the 
rate of 106 roubles per head; the %ing detachments purchased 
horses at an average of 81 to 93 roubles, while the military 
administration paid for them 100 roubles and more. One dress- 
ing cost the Eed Cross about from 8 to 13 roubles, while it 
cost the military administration from 15 to 18 roubles. As far 
as I remember, Alexandrovski was blamed for not havmg pre- 
sented his report in time — i. e., he neglected the formal side of 
the business.. But try to keep a systematic record with a limited 
personnel of clerks. Such a report would take, if conscientiously 
attended to, from ten to fifteen days of each month from the 
Plenipotentiary. What should he do? Keep up> formalities or 
devote himself to live work? Here, at the seat of war, -such 
reports would amount to nothing. Horses, products, all kinds 
bf articles are bought from the Chinese. According to rega- 
. lations, the report ought to be accompanied by documentary evi- 
dence — i. e., in this case by the receipted bills of the Chinese. 
The model of such a receipted bill lias even been elaborated. But 
what meaning would such bills convey to the Chinese? The con- 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE ^YAR. 77 

tents are absolntely incompreliensible to them, as they are printed 
in Eussian. ^Tiat could the persons verifying the bills make 
out of the hieroglyphics painted by the Chinese on these bills? 
In order to avoid bothering Avith each of the sellers separately 
a system was elaborated for nsc in Manchnria not only by the 
Eed Cross, but by other institutions, to give several bills at once 
to be signed by the Chinese interpreters, in bulk, so to say, with- 
out its making any difference as to who made the hieroglyphics 
on the shps. If such a document was not attached to a report, 
dishonesty was flagrant; if it was, everything was right. What 
value conld have a report accompanied by such documentary evi- 
dence? Wonld it not have been better should the superintendent 
simply enter the sum of the expenditure and the article for which 
it was expended? The essence of the matter would not be 
altered, but there would be much less work and the time 
spent upon the writing up of reports could be ntilized for 
more important business. As to Mr. Alexandrovski's capacity 
as an administrator, I must say that he is an energetic man^ 
knowing his work exceedingly well, and that his departure was 
greatly felt by the Eed Cross in this direction. General Kuro- 
patkin knew what he did when he invited him to take the place 
of Chief of the Health Service of the First Army. Alexandrovski 
managed the sanitary organization of the First Army during the 
j^attles of Mukden, and, thanks to his energy, all the wounded 
Avere evacuated; there remained not a wagon, not a cart behind. 
General Linevich asked him to return, acknowledging his use- 
ful activity. 

It seems to me that on the theater of war it is not so much 
abuse that matters as certain party bickerings which screen truly 
useful work. If the cause of the decrease of contributions is 
looked for, it mufet be sought first of all in that same party 
spirit and in the fact that the sad occurrences in the Eed Cross 
during time of peace keep the contributors from beheving in the 
managers of the Eed Cross. , 



78 



TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



The sanitary trains are very well organized and the personnel 
is excellent- They are of great assistance in the evaciiation of 
the wounded. Their number is^ however, insufficient, (and during 
fights the wounded had to be mostly transported in freight-cars, 
which, on account of lack of space, were literally filled with them. 

The Finnish two-wheel carts and tlie two-horse jDack stretch- 
ers afford excellent means of transportation. 



Chapter XIII. 

THE RAILWAY AND THE EVACUATION OF MUKDEN. 

The East Chinese Eailway is of enormous impoTtance in the 
present Russo-Japanese War. This line and, in general, the 
entire Siberian Railway present the only line of communication 
for more than half a million of troops, while one railway is nec- 
essary for each corps under normal conditions. The work of 
the Chinese Railway was increased by the circumstance that not 
only the troops and military stores arriving from Russia had to 
be carried, but also all kind of supplies, as fuel for the Army, 
timber and other materiel, bought and obtained on the spot. Dur- 
ing battle the railway had to transport ammunition, evacuate the 
wounded, and almost daily carry troops. It is wonderful that 
it was able to solve tJiis difficut problem with the means at its 
disposition, with the capacity of trafllc for which it was prepared. 
The same may be said about thei Siberian line. 

When General Jvhorvat took upon himself the management 
of the Chinese Railway, its construction was far from being com- 
pleted; according to the budget some 40,000,000 roubles were 
assigned for building expenditures. The traffic increased with 
every day, while the moneys for the bringing of the line to the 
requisite condition were not forthcoming (during thei last months 
before the war tlie traffic returns reached very large figures, almost 
2,000,000 roubles per month). 

The war found the railway unprepared for the enormous 
amount of work in store for it at the beginning of the military 
operations. It w^as necessary to increase as rapidly as possible 
the number of sidings, enlarge the stations, install additional 
water-supply plants and many other apparatus. The work 
was energetically proceeded with, and, thanks to the unflagging 

79 



80 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

activity of General I-Qiorvat, his assistant, Prince Eiilkoff (the 
Chief of Eepairs), and the entire railway personnel j this difficult 
task was completed in the course of a few months. In addition 
to all this, there was a lack of fuel for such an immense traffic, 
^ew coal-mine shafts had to he opened. There were excellent 
■mines near the Yantay station, but after the battle of Liaoyang 
they remained in the hands of the Japanese. In addition to 
these, there was coal in the Fusliun mines, worked by the Chi- 
nese for an immense period of time — these being, probably, the 
oldest mines in the world. But they were situated at a distance 
of 40 versis from the railway line, and it was, consequently, 
necessary to build a branch line to this point. No means were 
Allotted for this purpose, and there was likewise no permit to 
build from the Chinese authorities. General Khorvat then con- 
structed at his own risk and peril this branch which played a 
prominent role during our occupation of the ^lukden rayon. 
Moreover, as the railway agents were acquainted with the local 
conditions, they were entrusted with various operations relating 
to the purchase of provisions, and they discharged this duty ac- 
curately and always in time. The employees, occupying for- 
merely apartmeiiits of two, three, and more rooms, were, during the 
military operations, quartered with their families in one room, 
while the available buildings along the whole line were trans- 
formed into hospitals, lazarets, and other military establishments, 
a measure which rendered enormous service. Only by the ener- 
getic, unselfish work of all the employees of the railway, ani- 
mated by the desire of giving all the assistance in their power 
to their native country, was it possible for this line to fulfill the 
difficult task which had fallen to its share. It is only by this 
self-sacrificing activity of the entire railway personnel that can be 
explained the scarcity o5 accidents in spite of such increased 
iiraffic. The same nuist be said about the activity of all the agents 
of the Siberian Eailway. 

AU the works for the purpose of increasing the carrying 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR, Ql 

capacity and the exploitation of tlie railway were carried out un- 
der the siinultaneons command of three chiefs : the Chief of the 
Railway ^Administration, attached to the Viceroy ; the Chief of the 
Military Transportation ot Troops, attached to the Commander- 
in-chief; and the Chief of the Eear. Each of these operated inde- 
pendentl\^, gave out orders and regulations, made out dispositions, 
and the outcome of all this was a chaos which hindered the rail- 
way ijcrsonnel from doing their work. This dilficult state of 
affairs was not altered after the recall of the Viceroy from the' 
theater of war; on thci conti^ary, matters grew still worse after 
his departure. General ^iedermiiller, whO' was Chief of the Rail- 
way Administration, attached to the Viceroy, possessed great tact 
and could be argued with, while his successor lacked these quali- 
ties. AVliat was tlie position of the Chief of the Line on whom 
rested the entire responsibility, having all these commanders 
above him, these managers; carrying no responsibility whatever? 
His orders were countermanded often by word of mouth, the rail- 
way employees did not know whom they were to obe}^, whom they 
were subordinate to — and all this had a nefarious influence upon 
their work. 

The principal thing is, that these indirect chiefs were often 
absolutely incompetent as far as railway matters were concerned. 
It is impossible to demand from them any knowledge as to rail- 
way business, for the capiability of directing the traffic and man- 
aging the complicated railway work is acquired by long practice, 
by a detailed acquaintance with all the springs of this mechan- 
ism. Under such conditions, tadt and caution must be the lead- 
ing principles. Want of tact, arrogance, fault-finding, often met 
even in the orders and documents of these managers of the rail- 
way, brought the perso7inel to the point of wanting to give up 
everything and leaving. I happened to hear more than once 
how the railway employees said with sorrow that for all their 
pains, all their work, leaving them literally without sleep or 
rest^ all they got wa^s insults. I know somewhat General Khor- 



82, 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



vat. He is a man understanding his work thoroughly, remarkably 
tactful and ambitious. It was necessary to be deeply imbued with 
the consciousness of his responsibility, his duty towards his mother 
country, the obligation to fulfill his duty, no matter what the con- 
ditions might be, to work under the circumstances andi within 
the atmosphere which surrounded him. The same may be said 
about the entire personnel. 

They were absolutely martyrs, laiowing no rest either by day 
or night. A¥hat immense work fell to their share during our 
1-etreats — and we did nothing but retreat! How much self- 
abnegation did not they display in their work! The telegraph 
operators were the last to leave the depots. Wlien the Japanese 
reached onei semaphore, they were at the next, carr}dng! the tele- 
graph apparatus on their shoulders. The telegraph line was being 
repaired under showers of bullets. Trains were started under 
rifle and artillery fire. And these were civilian employees, serv- 
ing out of their own free will and under no obligation to risk 
thus their lives. All this arose from a sensie: of duty, from a desire 
to be of use to their country as far as it lay in their power. And 
for all this self-abnegation, for all this tremendous work, all they 
received was abuse — ^they heard not a word of gratitude or com- 
mendation from the higher commanders. Where is the man who 
did not abuse them ? Even after the celebrated attack and battle 
on the Shakhe, the CommandeT-in-chief issued an order in which 
he thanked all the participators in the affair, but not a word was 
said about the railway employees. Only after the Minister of 
Finance, in whose jurisdiction belongs the East Chinese Eail- 
way, had asked by telegraph about the work of the railway person^ 
^el, did General Kuropatkin remember this branch and telegraph 
back that there could not be any two opinions about their highly 
useful and energetic activity. The Commander-in-chief »might, 
under stress of his many obligations, forget his railway employees, 
but such forgetfulness is absolutely unpardonable in the Chief of 
Military Communications, as it may be explained by the desire 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. §3 

cf lesseniiig the usefulness of the railway personnel and thus in- 
creasing the impoTtance of the managers of military communi- 
cations. In General KhoTvat's order to the railway employees 
after the Minister of Finance had communicated to him General 
Kuropatkin's answer^ we read the following words in which a 
shade of bitterness may be noticed : ^'We do not work for praise, 
we work for the purpose' of assisting the Tsar and our mother 
country in this year of trials." Such relations of the Chiefs of 
Military Communications towards the employees of the railway 
could hardly serve as incentives to greater energy, so indispensa- 
ble in such difficult and trying times. If the railway personnel 
has successfully accomplished the problem placed before it, it was 
only thanks to their feeling of citizenship, the sentiment of their 
obligation to tlieir country with which they were penetrated. 

Happening to be often at the station, I could see how the 
personnel worked. I always found Messrs. Slavuta and Aghieff, 
chiefs of the sections of traffic, in the telegraph-room filled with 
tobacco smoke and vitiated air, sitting at their apparatus and send- 
ing out orders along the line. This was so both by day and 
by night. I absolutely could not undersand when these men 
rested, ate', and slept. It seemed as if they never left their tele- 
graph apparatus. 

And these men for such work could not even hope to receive 
thanks in an order issued to the troops. 

I shall not dispute the regulations, according to which the 
military autliorities in time of war extend their jurisdiction over 
the railways existing in the rayon of the military operations. It 
seems to me that they must have a constant eye to the traffic and 
the railways themselves, and in the present war, not only on the 
line traversing the theater of war, but on the entire Siberian 
Eailway, being the only line of communication and supplying 
artery of the Army. But this inspection must be organized in 
a practical way. It seemed to me that it would be better to place 
the entire Siberian and Chinese railways under the management 



84 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



of one person, but with the condition that he should not meddle 
an the regulations issued for the immediate interior management 
of the line,, as any foreign meddling would bring only confusion 
into the complicated work of railway administration. This per- 
son should limit himself to making certain demands from the 
railway persofinel and seeing that these demands be accurately 
complied with. For this j)urpose he must be vested with great 
power. At present there are many chiefs : one on the Siberian 
Eailway line, another in the rear of the Army at Kharbin, and 
a third with the advanced troops. We must add to this the 
meddling with the administration of movements of troops of the 
General Staff. Their activity is in no wise concentrated and their 
orders are often conflicting. What can be expected? of such a con^ 
dition of affairs ? 



I remember well the evening of February 24th, when orders 
were given to retreat. There remained many wounded at the Muk- 
den station, also projectiles, the siege artiller}', and many mate-. 
rials which it was absolutely necessary to take along. It was 
also necessary to take all the rolling stock. The director of the 
traffic, Mr. Slavuta, assembled all the engine-drivers. They ar- 
rived tired out, black from the dirt and dust that had gathered 
on them and which, probably, it would be impossible for them to 
iwash off for several days. Mr. Slavuta told them of the impending 
hard work: "Gentlemen, orders have come to retreat. At the 
station there are many of our wounded brethren who shed their 
blood for our beloved countr}^, many materials of all kinds, which 
we caimot leave behind. All this must be removed before morn- 
ing, for to-morrow this station will be in the hands of the enemy. 
We will have to send out trains every two or three minutes. The 
way of the retreat is through tlie enemy's fire, which many of you 
have witnessed. This means that we will have to move in dark- 
ness. A difficult and responsible task is before you. Remember 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 85 

that should a collision take place, our game would be lost. The 
traffic will be stopped, and then our wounded brothers and all the 
materiel so indispensable to us, will fall into the hands of the 
enem}^, the entire order of the retreat will be upset/' And the 
engineers answered him, all as one man, that they understood 
fully the responsibility resting upon them and that^they would 
do their utmost to avoid accidents. 

The trains, filled with wounded, started one after the other, 
each consisting of from forty to fifty cars. The engineers were 
forced to strain their eyes untO' pain, leaning with the entire body 
out of the caboose, to be able to distinguish something in the dark 
and to avoid collision with the train going in front of them. To- 
wards morning everything was successfully hauled away. The 
last train left Mukden at 6 o'clock in the morning. It was neces- 
sary to leave at Mukden several hundreds of seriously wounded 
soldiers. 

The sight presented by the evacuation of Mulvden was awful. 
An immense conflagration — the Intend ancy stores, tlie supplies of 
ghiaolan, wood, and timber were burning, and millions of sparks 
rose into the soft, mellow night, for not a breath of wind was 
stirring. The air was filled with burning atoms, which, illumin- 
ated by the fire, seemed an enormous swarm of moving insects. 
Flour-bags burst from the heat and columns of the finest dust 
rushed into the air like some extraordinary fireworl^s. The sight 
was imposing, unusually beautiful, but terror-inspiring. The 
platform of the station and/ all the surroundings were brightly 
illuminated. On the platfonn a string of stretchers with the 
wounded was continually passing by, some of these covered up 
with their heads in blankets from under which heart-rending 
means were heard, unconscious of what was going on around them^ 
heedless of this fearful light or of the darkness of night, for to 
them everything was dark from unbearable pain. Among the 
stretchers men were hurrying to the depot, some carrying valises, 
some ordinary bundles; each and every one wanting to take along 



86 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



as much of his property as was possible. But they were met with 
disappointment at the station, for they were lucky if they found 
room for themselves on the train. Further, near the store, where 
the presents sent to the men from Eussia for the holidays were 
kept, soldiers were busy chosing various articles. Some of them 
took off their old felt boots to replace them by new ones, others 
changed their linen in the cold. 

All this was lit up by a gigantic conflagration. 

Further still a merchant^, retreating with the troops, unable 
to take along all his goods, was distributing them among the sol- 
diers in order that they should not fall into the hands of the 
enemy. A crowed of men surrounded his store. Upon receiving 
their presents, the recipients walked rapidly away, some carrying 
a bottle of brandy or of rum which the merchant had hoped to sell 
to the oiScers for a big price. Some of them opened the bottles 
on the way and drank as they w^alked. 

The gigantic bonfire was illuminating the scene. 

G-reaii bustling reigned at the station. Everyone tried to 
get into the nearest train, fearing to be left behind. None thought 
any more of his belongings^ being anxious only about himself. 
The platform was covered with various articles brought there to 
be sent away, but left on account of lack of room. Stretchers 
were coming up continually and were carefully transported into the 
cars. Somewhat aside a railway employee was standing in front 
of the house he had been occupying for years, w^here he had so 
lovingly made his home and with which he was loath to part. 

One after the othier the trains departed in long unbroken 
lines to the north. 

The last train was ready to start. The medical personnel 
remaining at Mukden assembled for the purpose of seeing off the 
last defenders of the former Eussian possession, which may the 
Lord allow us to* have lost but temporarily. The train moved, 
the last, good-byes of the travelers were heard, when a deafening 
report sounded — a salute to this last train. The ammunition- 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 87 

chests had exploded. Other reports were heard in the distaii c-o, 
reports that were silent during the night, but with the morning 
began again their dire work. Two nations were destroying each 
other for the possession of tliese already ruined points. Which 
of them will be called to remove the traces of destruction and 
implant new civilization? 

At the sound of the roar of artillery the last train, filled to 
bursting with wounded and unscathed soldiers, moved away from 
Mukden. 

The railway employees sat cloise to each other on the roofs 
of the cars, being the last ones toi leave Mukden, where they were 
the j&rst pioneers of civilization, l^hey were sorrowful, pained and 
ashamed to abandon and leave to other hands the work they had 
begun with so much love. 

An immense torch was lighting their way of retreat. The 
pale tints of dawn were already struggling with the red glow of 
this torch that was consuming tlie millions painfully earned by 
the Eussian people through the sweat of the brow. 



Cpiapter XIY. 



MILITAEY CEXSOESHIP. 



Tlie military censorshiiD is eoncentrated in Ihe' Staff of the 
Comniander-iru-cMef ; tliere are censor sections in the separate 
armies^ so that all the telegraphic information of the Russian and 
all the articles of the foreign correspondents^, without any excep- 
tion whatever, are authorized by the censor attached to the 
Commander-in-chief. Thus every telegraphic information sent 
from any of the telegraph stations at the advanced posts, before 
being forwarded to its destination, must go to the censor and then 
again back to the telegraph station to be for^varded to the addres- 
see. Such procedure hampers and postpones the timely forward- 
ing of correspondence. Only correspondence from Kharbin is 
authorized by the censorship established in the Staff of the Chief 
of the Eear. The censorship in the Staff of the Commander-ni- 
chief is entrusted to Colonel E. F, Pestich, of the Genearl Staff. 
1 can say nothing but what is commendable about this officer, pos- 
sessing tact to the highest degree and imbued with the sentiment 
of his duty. Personally he considers the press from a much 
broader and more equitable point of view than his chiefs — ;the 
Staff of the Commander-in-chief with General Sakharoff at its 
head, a man looking upon the press as an inevitable evil, which 
has to be suffered in the Army only on account of the aberrate opin- 
ion as to the- usefulness of the press having taken root so firmly. 
General Sakharoff thinks that the correspondents are present on 
the theater of military operations only for the purpose of spying 
and denouncing everything that takes place in the Army; for this 
reason, according to his opinion, the correspondents must be treat- 
er with the utmost severity, and Colonel Pestich, consequently, 
could not but submit to the views of his immediate chief and was 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. §9 

often placed in the luoct pamfui position. Tlie opinion of tlic 
Commander-in-chief was opposed to that of his chief of Staff, bnt, 
being continually busy, he was rarely accessible to the censors, and 
thus the point of viewt of the chief of Staff predominafed. Gen- 
eral Sakharoff did not wish to understand that the public desired 
and had a right to be acquainted with the course of affairs going 
on at the theater of war, that it is interested in each movement, 
even the most insignificant one of our armies, and that it must 
know the positive as well as the negative sides of the organization 
of all the military establishments and all those belonging to them. 
There, far away from their native countr}^, die thousands of men, 
not strangers ; there flows the blood of that same^ Kussian public, 
of its children, its brothers; on its means the very war is being 
waged — ^how should it not have the right to know^ what is happen- 
ing to those that are near to it and how its means are being ex- 
pended ? The chief of Staff forgot that the Eussian public could 
not, by his short and matter-of-fact informations, have the slight- 
est idea of the course of the war and. the condition of our Army, 
and that the press alone formed by its correspondents the only 
link between the public and all those that were engaged in the war. 
These correspondents alone informed the Eussian people how 
bravely fought and died for the honor and glory of Eussia their 
fathers, sons and brothers, under what conditions they lived and 
what they needed. 

It is true that not all the correspondents were at the height 
of their calling with regard to unpreiudiced representation of 
the events. Many had a strong tendency to show everything in a 
negative light, perhaps on account of the inclination, extant among 
the Eussian intellectual class, to self-condemnation. I recall a 
conversation I had with one of the correspondents : 
"Why,'' asked I, "don't you mention this fact?" 
"You see, I belong to the liberal part}-, and this is why I can 
not mention this fact so as not to awal^:en an optimistic sentiment 
in the public; as to yourself, it is quite different; you can doi it.'' 



90 'J^-SE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

^T bog your pardon/^, I began with indignaition ; ^^do you 
mmn to say that if I mention a positive fact, which will bring joy 
to the Eussian people^ whose relatives and loved ones are here 
shedding their blood, I testify to my being a retrograde ? To tell 
the truth, is this to be a retrograde ? I deem it my duty to men- 
tion side by side with the negative faots — the suppression of 
which, according to my opinion, is likewise a crime^ — the positive 
'ones. By this I do not by any means narrow my views as a free 
thinl^er/^ 

The position of a correspondent is not easy during war. Tne 
various institutions and persons take care of everybody, install 
everybody, but no one has thought of rendering the difficult task 
of the correspondents less heav}-. jS^ot mentioning the fact that 
tJie correspondent often does not know where to rest his head, as 
all available buildings are taken for military and other institu- 
tions; that he often does not know with what to appease his 
hunger — ^he never meets anyone aspiring to acquaint him with 
the true condition of affairs. What reproaches are heaped upon 
the correspondent for each inexact comm,unication ! But has any- 
one assisted him to verify the information received by him from 
without. I had recourse to the Commander-in-chief, asking him 
to establish a bureau where tlie correspondents could verify their 
informations. I was promised that such a bureau would be in- 
stituted, but there it ended. ISTot a few are the privations falling 
to the share of the correspondent during the pursuit of his voca- 
tion. I do not know why the public is under the impression that 
the correspondents are being courted. I will mention an incident 
which happened to me and wliich does not speak in favor of this 
belief. I came once to the staff of one of the armies (I shall not 
say which) ; it was night and the cold was 15 degrees below zero. 
As I naturally do not like higher chiefs, I laid before the chief of 
etapes my request for the assignment of some kind of shelter for 
the night, but he refused. I was obliged to have recourse to 
higher authorities. I foiuxd one general. 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 91 

"Please, find me some place for the night; it is cold out 
doors, my horse is tired, and, as it is so late, I can hardly get to 
another place/' 

"I have no room for you; some three versts from here is 
a fanza, where, maybe, you might find shelter," answered the 
general. 

"It will be difiicult for me to find this fanza alone in the 
dark; moreover, the eentinels may take me for a spy," I tried as 
a last argument. 

"Well, you may act as you please." 

I accidentally met an officer of my acquaintance, who iavited 
me to the dining-room to talve tea. I rejoiced, and we had already 
begun drinking our tea, when my friend was suddenly called aside. 
He was reprimanded for his invitation, and I found mvself again 
outdoors. That 's what it means to be a war correspondent ! 
^Yhere was the vaunted Russian hospitality ? At any rate, could 
these people be called Russians ? I hasten to add that such cases 
are comparatively rare. I am sure that had the commander of the 
Army, whose Staif has received me with &o much cordiality, heard 
of this incident, knowing him to be: one of the most hospitable of 
men, he would surely not have praised his subordinates. 

In addition to privations, the sojourn of a correspondent at 
the seat of war is subjected to maaiy limitations. The permit to 
be present at the theater of war in general is given by the chief of 
Staff of the Commaiider-in-chief, in spite of which, whenever the 
correspondent desires to go to a certain army, he is obliged to get 
another permit for the sojourn in that pai^ticular army. Such a 
permit is likewise issued from the Staff of the Commander-in- 
chief. But, notwithstanding this, another permit has to be re- 
ceived from the Stafi: of the given army for the sojourn in one of 
its component parts (corps) ; in the Staff of that corps it isi nec- 
essary to obtain a third permit to be able to be present in one of 
its smaller units, and so forth ; one permit after another has to be 
issued indefinitely. How much time is spent uselessly to obtain 



92 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

these permits! Each time the coTrespondent wished to go to an- 
other ariny, he must go to the headquarters for a new permit. 
Would it not be simpler to give, instead of all these permits, one 
general permit to visit all the annies ? and, should this be indis- 
pensable, the other permits might be issued, on the strength of the 
general one, for the sojourn in their component units. 

Should one keep strictly to the rules and regulations issued 
for military censorship and the guidance of the war correspond- 
ents, it v/ould be literally impossible to write about anything else 
but the weather, and tliis with caution, so that the enemy should 
not know^ if our soldiers suffer from the heat or the cold. There 
remains but one thing to he done — ^to repeat the telegrams- sent 
by the Commander-in-chief to the Emperor or to the? General 
Staff. These telegrams, since they are on the tapis, become loiown 
to the Army only through the telegrams of the St. Petersburg 
telegraph agencies. Let me ask, Whj are war correspondents 
wanted on the theater of military operation under such condi- 
tions? It is understood that it is impossible to conform to all 
these regulations^, and the censors must, nolens volens, deviate from 
them according to circumstances; but then, what sense is there 
in their issuing? Why should the censors be uselessly placed 
in an embarrassing position? The authorities issuing these reg- 
ulations limit themselves, as they always do, to issuing them, 
while the execution rests entirely upon the subordinates, and if, 
should the necessity arise, these subordinates are; forced to partly 
ignore them, all the responsibility rests on their shoulders : should 
any misunderstanding arise, they alone will answer. 

In additdon to censorship at the seat of war, there exists 
another — at St. Petersburg, in the General Staff — which, so to say, 
verifies the former and without 'this second censure no correspond- 
ence can be printed. It seems to me that, once the persons are 
,on the spot where the events are taking place, they ought to know 
Avhat may and what may not be allowed to ^appear in the organs 
of the press; it! seems to me that one niilitary censure Isi suffi- 



TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 93 

dent; but no, it is being controlled and corrected by other per- 
sons, some 10,000 versts distant on the other side of the globe, 
little acquainted witli the condition of affairs, ignorant of the 
po'sitive as well as of the? negative sides of the local military life. 
Is there any sense in such a control and is it not absolutely 
irrelevant ? 

Moreover, distrust seems to be one of the typical traits of 
our bureaucratic organization. Eacli of oui^ institutions is sub- 
ordinate to another controlling it. The public distrusts the 
bureaucracy, while the bureaucracy distrusts the public and itself. 
(This distrust is the only reason for the lack of truly useful work- 
ers in the arena of social and political life. Distrust alone is an- 
swerable for the fact that we lack talented men of our own. Is 
it possible to admit that in a nation counting 150,000,000 men 
there should be no distinguished ones ? They exist, but the general 
distrust hinders them from displaying their innate and acquired 
capabilities. 

I often could not recognize my telegrams, and yet each word, 
(each expression had been strictly weighed and discussed by the 
jlocal censorship, and sometimes in serious conversation with the 
Commander-in-chief. At the heojd of the censorship is at pres- 
ent General Polivanoff, appointed as assistant to the chief of the 
Greneral Staff, formerly the editor of the Russhi Invalid and the 
Yoyenniy ShorniJc. During his editorship these organs t)ecanie 
unrecognizable. It was interesting to read them, while formerly 
they served only to make known the orders and regulations of the 
military authorities. I believe tliat at present, when there is at the 
head of the censorship a man who, in addition to his other qual- 
ities necessary toi a sitatesman, understands fully the im^portance 
of the printed word, and wlieni the new Commander-in-chief has 
a high opinion of the importance of the press and his Staff con- 
curs in this opinion — the censorship of military correspondence 
will be established on other, more rational principles. 



Chapter XV. 

THE EEAE OF THE AEMY. 

There were three rears on the theater of war before the evac- 
uation of Mnkden: the closest one at Mukden, a more distant 
one at Telin, and the tfarthest at Kliarbin. 

Mukden was the center of all the establishments of the adtive 
armies. The Intendancy, the Control, the Exchequer, the Bureau 
of Military Communications, the lazarets, and so forth. Mukden 
as a big Chinese city, supplied the troops ^^dth various provisions. 
The station of Mukden was the terminus and the principal sta- 
tion of the, rail way line. At that station were various stores of 
provisions, ammunition, and other articles. No women were 
allowed at Mukden except the Sisters of Mercy and the "mar- 
garine Sisters.'^ A mass of various people had arrived here from 
tibroQfd and from Eussia as camp-followers: Caucasians, Greeks, 
Frenchmen, Italians from Chefoo* and Shanghai, and many Chi- 
nese from the Chinese and Manchu provinces. It is more than 
probable that there were many spies among these so-called "jack- 
als" of the Army. 

Telin was, so to say, a large intermediary etaye. Here were 
concentrated the bakeries, the stores of certain provisions and the 
hospitals. This was the hnal point in which the presence of 
woman was allowed, and for this reason there appeared here rest- 
aurants and other establishments, attracting young officers, who 
[used to come here for "recreation" during-* their short leaves of 
absence. Drunlven orgies and scandals even took place here. I 
must admit with regret tiiat drunkenness was in general greatly 
developed among the officers ; but cards, so prevalent in other wars, 
found no favor, and the officers sent most of their savings home. 

94 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 95 

The reports of the Chinese Bank and of the mail will be very in- 
teTesting concerning this feature. 

KJiarbin is our principal nucleus on the Chinese Eailway, 
running south to Port Arthur and east to Yladivostok. Here 
were concentrated the troops arriving from IJussia, the marching 
commands of the rank ajid file^ and the oilicers needed for the 
completing of the units. In general, this was the principal mil- 
itary eta'pe for all the J\[anchurian armies. Here were estah- 
iished the hospitals and lazarets for the sick and wouuded w1io 
could return comjD'aratively sooai to the active army. From this 
point were evacuated to.Eussia, after a certain period of time, 
the severely wounded ones and all those ^Adio needed a longer 
'period for recO'very. Here took place the prejjai-ation of provis- 
ions, and were likeAvise concentrated the principal reserve stores. 
At Ivharbin was the seat of tlie administration of the entire East 
Chinese lia.ih\'ay^ and here AA'as a large branch of the Cliinese 
Bank. In addition to the military, Kharbin counted 40,000 
inhabitants. To thi^s point ]iad migrated people fi'om all the 
localities of the world for tlie purpose of profiting in some way or 
other. Here were a large number of liotels, restaurants, and all 
kind of recreative establishments,, and a nuuierous contingent of 
"singers.'' Here is the realm of drunken bouts, of oi'gies and 
all kinds of disorders which I have no desire: to describe — in fact, 
would be ashamed to do so. Here is the kingdom of gossij:) and 
various rumors. What could not you hca.r' at J\haibin? The 
military and the civilians were both poss 3:-sed with the rage of 
telling news. .A man newly arrived from Ku^^ia is simply terror- 
stricken by these tales. ^'0 God^ where are we going?'' thinks 
he. But upon the arrival to the advanced posits these fears dis- 
appear^ and there arises the doubt if all these tale-bearers have 
ever been at the seat of war^ and if those terrible tales are not 
pure inventions ? All gossip : some because they are drunk and 
some because they have nothing to do; others, again, for tlie 2)ur- 

—7- 



gg THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

pose of fishing in troubled waters, and there are many of such 
in Kharbin and in general in all Manchuria. 

The corruption and cynicism reigning at Kharbin have no 
bounds. As an illustration of the cynicism and depravity, I 
will mention the following picture of Kharbin habits. I went 
once on foot with a colonel of the custom guards from the city 
to the station. In front of us there walked a well-dressed couple. 
They were follo^^^ed by two officers, probably from the reserves, 
and words which no censure would ever pass, fell in showers to 
the address of the lady. The couple increased their gait, the offi- 
cers did the same. At last the gentleman stopped and very cor- 
rectly stated to the officers: 

"Gentlemen, this is my wife and not a prostitute. I beg 
of you to deliver her from the necessity of listening to your im- 
proper speech/'^ 

To this one of the oificers pronounced the following tirade : 
"See here/' and there followed an unprintable Eussian word, 
"we have to shed our blood for you and we dare not touch your 
wives — " 

Only the interference of the colonel put a stop to the aggres- 
siveness of the officers, and maybe to something still more serious. 
In the time of peace, when the officers' corps deems one of their 
members unworthy to wear the uniform, they ask him to leave the 
Army, and he generally goes to tbe reserve. When the comi- 
try is in need of its best officers to lead the military operations, 
these officers, found unworthy during peace-time, again get into 
the Army. Men considered as a harmful element in time of peace 
again become the leaders of soldiers in time of war, when the 
strict observance of discipline and a good example are of the 
greatest importance. What may be expected of such leadership? 
Of course, there are exceptions, and we meet men who had suc- 
ceeded in reforming. I heard the following case from the lip^ 
of a person occupying a prominent post in the Army: 

"One day/' said that person, "there came to me an officer 



TBE TRUTH ABOUT THE Ti AB 97 

at Mukden. He greets me and promises to come again. Of 
course, we are glad to see anyone here, but I could not recall 
where I had seen him and how I had made his acquaintance. At 
last I remembered. 

"I was told once," continued the narrator, "that a gentle- 
man wanted to see me. I received him and it came out that he 
was a retired officer ^without means,' and so forth. I gave him 
a certain sum. A few minutes later some errand brought me 
to my wife (I have two entrances on the same stair-landing). 
Wliat was my surprise when I saw in her apartment the same 
man with the same request for assistaiuce. It was evident that 
begging had become his profession.." 

It is not difficuH to see how much the Army would gain in 
time of war if it were rid forever of this element, undesirable 
even in time of peace. 

The rear in general is one of the plagues of the Army. I 
am not a cruel man by nature, but here I deem the most draconic 
measures necessary. The Chief of the Eear must be a man well 
known for his strictness, vested with immense power, including 
the right of condemning culprits to be shot without previous 
judgment. 



Chapter XVI. 

CAUSE OF OUR FAILURE. 

Now, after all the above mentioned, I will endeavor, without 
entering into details, to explain the causes of our failure in gen- 
eral and of the Mukden operations m particular. 

The principal cause of all our failures in the present war 
lies, according to my opinion, in the fact that we have but one 
.line of communication on thei theater of Avar — ^one pair of rails 
of the East Chinese Railway and a similar one pair of rails of 
the Siberian one, over which both the troops and the yvav male- 
riel has to be carried. But though we were unable to increase to 
the necessary dimensions the carrying capacity of. the Siberian 
Railwa}^, we had the possibility of building at the very seat of 
military operations two lines of communication for a more suc- 
cessful conduct of the operations, the movement of troops, the 
transpO'rtation of military supplies and provisions. We had ail 
the necessary means at hand, and only the lack of consciousness 
of the necessity of these two lines hindered us from taking ad- 
vantage of them. We could have easily built these two railway 
lines, one from Crundjulin, or, still better, from Kharbin, in the 
direction of Sinmintin along the valley of the Liaokhe River, 
tlie other from that same G-undjulin to Fushun, and further over 
a broken terrain, choosing the best system, at a distance of 25 to 
35 versts from the existing railw^ay line. The construction of 
these branches could have been executed in a short time, as there 
could l-^e found on the spot a cadre of skillful technical engineer^ 
and the working force in the local Chinese population. Some 
difficulties might have arisen as to the railway materiel and the 
transportation of the materials would have had to take place with 



TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. ^ 99 

• A -Rni if wp take into consideration the 

:, l; ha.e been .ecessary-i. e. son. twenty ^s of h^.po - 
fuion ) Lastly, should it have been impossible to bring he 
:;'...« i;oiii Eu.ia, tl. ..is fi-om tlie i.a. ^o K aba 
roY»k might have been temporarily taken up and a mail coacli 
old ^ Ibed to that city. IChaharovsk .vould have suffered, 
bat how much would not the -'l^^axy operations have gam d 

Having two lines of commmiicatiou, ^mei by ra 1 with each 
other and with the Chinese Railway, two branches having been 
eln Wed-one, for example, on the parallel of Te hn and the 
ler on the pa.llel of Mukden-.ur Army eoum ... oa. y 
proceeded with all its operations. The ^^--^Vf''\''\'^^J''^^^ 
iiid of military supplies would have been -*f t t "l.c^nt 
what is still more important, we could have -f /" f ^ ^'ui 
.Here the necessity should arise large bodies o >-l ^ « - 
fatioaiin.. the soldiers. We would not have needed to be in feai 
S tlie toning movements of the enemy; on the con rai,, ^v. 
uld have made such turning movements ourselves without n.k- 
■n" being cut off, for then we would have had a railwav hue m our 
rear carrying provisions and amimmition to our lines 

Om trfois always repulsed the open attacks ol the enemy 
,,„a the Japanese did not have great success with them Init agams 
tl,e turning movements, especially those outs.de the Imuts of 1 

inese ^ilway, we were absolutely defenseless, ^'^ ^';yr^^ 
always in our troops i-etreating. In general, we were httle capa 
e of maneuvering without the limits of our line « — m - 
eation; it looked as if we had lieen glued to the East Chnie.e Rail- 
way and did not even try to leave its region. 

Our too bulky and unwieldy train was a great impediment 

Lsrc 



200 ^ ^^^ TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR 

to our facility of movemeiDt. I saw the retreat of the train to 
Telin, and therefore had the opportunity of observing all its di- 
mensions, for when it was distributed among its units, it did not 
catch the eye so much. Drawn out into one line, this row of 
yehicles with various military possessions, Avith stools, tables, 
barrels (I asked, "Why do you carry these barrels along?" and 
was answered, "Just so', we might need them, perhaps"), and 
other household articles, demanding large means of transporta- 
tion, made such an impTebsion that one doubted if it could ever 
get away and that one thought that should part of it fall into 
the hands of the enemy, we would not lose much by it. The 
Japanese, not desiring to abandon their booty, would carry it 
along with them, and then, perhaps it would be we, and not they, 
who would press upon the other — i. e., our roles might have been 
inverted. 

Where did all these housdiold articles come from? War is 
not a picinic, not a ^Mrtie de plaisir. In time of war who can think 
of comfort? and it is impossible to fight without privations, and 
even very great ones. Wlience comes this aspiration for a com- 
fortable life on the positions? The Eussian troops did not dis- 
tinguish themselves by such aspirations in former wars. Maybe 
it is the result of the general progress in civilization? I believe 
that this is not the case. The exam23le given by the higher 
authorities had much to do with it. To give a better idea of 
the luxury in which these higher authorities lived, I shall have, 
in spite of my desire to the contrary, to touch upon the life of the 
late Commander-in-chief and Viceroy m the Far East, Admiral 
Alexieff. 

Admiral Alexieif, in addition to the luxurious apartments 
of his house at Port Arthur, at Daln}', and, during the latter 
months, at Mukden, had a magnificent train consisting of Pnll- 
man cars with immense parlors, and dining-rooms for himself 
and for his entire Staff. He traveled like a Czar. Before the 
starting of his train anotlier was sent out for the purpose of 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. IQl 

ascertaining the safety and good condition of the road. Admiral 
Alexieff did not like to travel by night and stopped at the sta- 
tions; but he conld not endure the whistles of the locomotives 
and the movement of the trains by night was disagreeable to him. 
And;, so as not to trouble the rest of his Excellency, not a train 
was allowed to come nearer to the station than the samaphores, 
and all miovement was interrupted over the rails lying close to 
the stations. The trains with troop^s and war materiel were wait- 
ing, howeveT necessary they might be, no matter how feverishly 
they were expected on the field of battle. 

following the example of Admiral Alexieff, General Kuro- 
patkin likewise asked for sucli a train, his chief of Staff did not 
wish to fare worse, and in the end separate trains with Pull- 
man cars became the ownership of all the comananders of the 
armies and even of the chiefs of some establishments. It came 
about that thus all the passenger cars on the Chinese Railway were 
taken for the chiefs, while the' greater part of the officers and pas- 
sengers had to be transported in freight cars. Thus, while some 
of the officers traveled in freight cars, or the so-called '^cattle 
cars,^^ their comrades of the Staffs lived and traveled in parlor 
cars. Such difference could not have a favorable: influence upon 
<heir relations, and the ancient enmity against the Staff officers, 
existing in time of peace, grew still more bitter here, at the seat 
of war, where it ought not to exist at all, where friendly joint 
work was necessary for success. But, in addition to enmity, such 
luxury awakened in the others likewise the desire to live comfort- 
ably. This was the cause of the agglomeration of such a mass 
of various articles, necessitating enormous means of transporta- 
tion. It was likewise brought about by long halts on one spot. 

In addition to this, these dwelling-trains had another bad in- 
fluence; they kept our Staffs chained to the railway, and, maybe 
On account of this, the operations were planned so as not to leave 
the railway — i. e., their luxurious dwellings. General Linevich 
was the only one to abandon his train and live in fanzas. Gen- 



102 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WyiR. 



eral Grippenberg was very much di&pleased that his train had no 
electric lights, as did the others, and had no peace until he had 
them put in. 

The frequent movements of these trains often impeded traffic 
at the stations on account oH necessar}^ maneuvers. Moreover, the 
necessity of maneu^'ers depeiided solely upon the phantasy of the 
chiefs at times. 

For example, one of the generals had a milch-cow sent him 
from Eussia. An officer, a General Staff officer, if you please, 
gave orders that the car with the cow should be placed at a certain 
point in the train, and for this j^urpose complicated maneuvers 
Mere needed. The cow was at last brought to the place designated, 
])ut it was found inconvenient by the general's valet, and again 
maneuvers were necessary for the purpose of changing the loca- 
tion of the car, and this, I believe', was done three times. The 
trains arrested near the semapliores could not reach the station 
on this account for a Avhole half-day. 

General Grippenberg occupied one brancli with his train, 
wliile tlie Coiumander-in-chief was on the other. The distance 
l>etween the two was only a few verst.s, which could have ])een 
made without any dilFieuliy whatever in a carriage l)y a good mud 
]"oad. But General Grippeiiberg desij'ed to travel in his train, 
and no assurances of the railway authorities, stating that the 
movements of his train, first to the main road and then again to 
the branch, took a great deal of time and hindered traffic, availed 
anything. 

It is well to mention here an incident whieh took place dur- 
ing the Franco-Prussian War. The royal train arrived at one of 
the stations. The chief of the station stated that if this train 
should be immediately aJlowed to j^rocecd, this would interfere 
A\ith the movement of the military trains and several days would 
be necessary to restore the order, but that should His Majesty re- 
main one day at this station, no ham]:>ering of the movement of 
trains would ensue. And the King remained at the station. I 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. ^q^ 

Mill sure that^ should a case like this take place with oui^ Euler, he 
would have acted like the King; but the question is, Would any- 
one have dared to state the matter to him ? Should a case like this 
be placed before an}- of our generals^ the chief of the station would 
have received no end of abuse and heard the well-known "I will 
place you under arrest." The movements of the trains would, of 
course, have been stopped. And such cases took jilace more than 
once. 

The cleaning of refuse from such trains cost about 50,000 
roubles a month to the administration of the rilway. 

During the present war the entire camp service is discharged 
by soldiers: that of the Japanese, by coolies. I think that we 
loo might have hired help for this purpose. This would cost a 
little more, but we would have many more bayoneiis. The non- 
combatant contingent of our armies, in general, is very large, about 
30 per cent, and no selection is made, so that often a young, mag- 
nificent soldier becomes a non^comWant, while a grizzly Ixarded 
reservist goes to the ranks. 'J'hcre arc in our Army, as I was told, 
some 40,000 officers' servants for some 11,000 or 1-3,000 oliicers— 
/. c, more than 3 men per officer on an average. In most eases 
tliese are the best soldiers, because [he oiTicers choose tlie most in- 
telligent and skillful among tliem as strikers. Of course, tlic 
officers cannoi be left witliout servants, but tlieir number might l)o 
limited to, let us say, 2 per officer on an average. This would give 
s(<nie 15,000 more bayonets to tiie ranks. During lulls the olficer 
might 'take as many men as he wants, out of his company ; but dur- 
ing battle, .when striker.- ai'c least necessary to the officers, when 
the duty of these liien is limited to the care of the officers' prop- 
erty and, in case of movements, to seeing that it is taken along, 
one sti'ikei might do for two officers, the others going ]>ack to the 
I'olors. This would have added several more thousands of fight- 
ing units, and (who knows?) the results might have been different 
at Liaoyang and ^.Tukden if we had had these surplus bayonets. 



-^Q^ THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

Little attention is paid in our Army, in general, to employ- 
jng hired help for various non-military purposes. For example, 
the engineers of the Chinese Eailway proposed to take upon them- 
selves the construction of various work& to be made by local work- 
men; such as roads, bridges, redoubts, and so forth, which are 
no^v being built by isappei" battalions and other troops. The num- 
ber of soldiers freed would have increased the contingent of 
combatants. This proposal, for some reason or other, was not 
accepted. 

The cavalry contingent on the theater of war is comparatively 
large, but in reality it is not sufficient even for reconnaissances; 
this is because cavalry is mostly requisitioned for convoys. Con- 
voys and orderlies are necessary, but the number in our Army 
is far above the required normal contingent.! Who has not a 
coinvoy and orderlies from among the cavalry ? 

The Staffs of the Commander-in-chief and of the command-. 
ers of armies knew little about the strength, movements, and 
intentions of the enemj^, while the Japanese knew literally every- 
thing concerning us. They received information concerning our 
dispositions even before these were made known to the command- 
ers of separate units. Our spy service, though considerable sums 
are expended upon it, is below all criticism. ]^ot one important 
information did we receive througii our spies. Here, likewise, 
large sums were expended absolutely unnecessarily, while in some 
cases, where they ought to have been paid, cents were grudged 
(the action of Oukhach-Oronovich in regard to the Chinaman 
who brought news as to the turning movement of the Japanese 
along the Liaokhe). In general, however well our spy service is 
organized at home, where Ave dispose of an entire army of spies, 
so l:)adly did we manage it here, where it was necessary to gain 
victory over the enemy. N"ot a few of our spies were in Japanese 
service and reported to us with the knowledge of their employers, 
and we believed such information. 

It has been said that our cavalry reconnoitered badly. It 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. ^05 

might be so^ but here too the system of distrust, reigning every- 
where among us, brought a great deal of harm. The distrust witli 
which the information secured by the reconnoiterers was received 
could have Idlled all 'desire for conscientious reconnaiissance. 
The principal thing was that no one endeavorc-d to verify the 
ground of such distrust, and nothing has such a baleful influence 
upon the work of subordinates as the unfounded distrust of their 
chiefs towards them. It is true that often the reports of the 
reconnoitering parties, especially concerning the numbers of the 
enemy, were: wrong. But this could not always be ascribed to the 
Jack of conscientiousness of the reconnoitering squads. It was 
difficult to obtain accurate information under the conditions in 
which they had to work. The rayon of military operations was 
thickly inhabited by Chinese; in almost each square' verst could 
be found a Chinese village surrounded by clay walls. It is not 
easy to find out how large is the numerical force of the enemy, 
taking into consideration that the natives, out of fear of the Jap- 
anese, always said what they were ordered. 

I was often a witness as to the way the chiefs received re- 
quests for reinforcements on accouni^ of the great losses suffered. 
In the greater part of cases such requests were refused, the re- 
fusal being explained by the statement that the commanders often 
exaggerated the importauce of their losses. It is true that some 
generals were ready to ask for reinforcements even before the 
light had begun ; but many asked for them only in case of actual 
need. Rarely did anyone ascertain if suppoTt was indeed neces- 
sar}^ — it was simply denied. There were many cases in which, 
en account of reinforcements not being sent, the affair took an 
undesirable aspect;, as^ for example, the already described affair 
of tlie 1st Siberian Regiment at Tashichao (battle of Mukden). 

The system of distrust reigned, in general, in the entire 
Army. The Commander-in-chief distrusted the commanders of 
the armies, as otherwise it would be impossible to explain why 
he gave instructions in regard to tlie most insignificant move- 



-^QQ THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

ments. The commanders of the armies had no right to move a 
single battalion without his knowledge. The dispositions were 
worked out up to the moat minute details in the Staff of the 
Commander-in-chief; this is why no one— 1 do not speak about 
the chiefs of small units — not even corps commaiKlcfs, could de- 
velop any initiative. The microbe of distrust had contaminated 
the entire Army — the chiefs distrusted their subordinates, the sub- 
ordinates distrusted their chiefs. All executed the orders only in a 
juechanical way, often not knowing anythiug as to cause and pur- 
port; each and every one aspired only to having a document — an 
order— 4o exonerate himself in case ot an unsuccessful ending of 
his operations. Tjie narrow limits of the order allowed no one to 
consider the good or evil arising from its execution. General 
Myloff was reprimanded for having decided to attack the enemy 
before the arrival of the Commander-in-chief, as had been or- 
dered the evening before. Later on the attack was admiitted as 
having been made at the opportune moment, and should the gen- 
eral have acted against liis convictio]i, the result might have been 
(liferent. 

Distrust came to the theater of war from Russia. Every- 
l)ody came to the active army with all the gossip, tlie intrigues 
and the ])ersonal feelings of peace-time. But this baggage 
of contaminated and corrupt contents could not have fallen on 
rich soil, if the higher authorities had shown in tb.eir relations 
to their su])ordinates tlie example of sincerity and trust. 

^'All say that we have no generals." 

'•Where do you take this from?" I asked. 

"Well, has any of otir generals shown any capacity?'^ is the 
ordinary answer. 

"But, please, when and where liad they the possibility of 
showing their capacity ?'" 

"What is it you are saying? We are fighting one year and a 
half.^^ 

"xill this looks so to you, because you are here; but go to 



TBE TRVTH ABOUT THE WAR. 107 

the front and you will see that our generals so far-I do not 
mention the chiefs of small units-even the corps eoir.n,anders, 
(had not until now the possibility of displaying any rndependerrce, 
taking anv initiativ-e. I say 'so far," hecau^e I think that with the 
new commander matters will be different." 

The system of General Kuropatkin-that of deciding upon 
everything himself, did not give his subordinate generals any 
possibility to act independcBtly and according to their own mi- 
totive. The generals Tserpitski, Myloff. Zarubayefl Misdrenko 
Rennenkampf. Ivanofi, Baniloffl, Kondratovich, Martynoff, and 
many others are all men possessing talent, energy^ and imtiaive. 
Let us -take General Mischenko as an example. Was it his place 
to be the chief of a cavalry, detachment? He is an artilleryman 
,,nd would have made an excellent corps commander, even an 
army commander, to whom important independent operations 
might ha.e been entrusted, all initiative being left to him ^es^ 
we have men and many of them, but our system does no allow 
them to put out their heads further than .vhat ^^V^nMae- 
cordin. to formality. Have we fe^v talented colonels m the Staff. 
,„d wWh the colors? I can name some ten of the most capable 
who might have commanded brigades and divisions Bu they 
are young, we are told, and have not the requisite grade. Therein 
lies the whole thing; we keep to the form, without paying any 
attention to the value. According to my opinion, if a colonel is 
eapable of commanding a corps, give him that corps ; if a talented 
captain may be a regimental commander, give him that regiment. 
It will be said to me : 
"What are their seniors to do':'" 

"If those seniors are incapable, untalented, let them go 
and rest. Military service is not a charitable institution; armies 
a re necessary for battles, and not for parades. 

Those who dub the officers of the General Staff as "do-littles 
arc wrong; they are wrong because not a few of them take part m 
. nil figVts, command separate units, and many of them have been 



jQQ THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

Avounded and killed in the field. It is true that the General 
Staff has occupied all the posts, even such where the special 
knowledge acquired at the Academy of the General Staff is not 
necessar}^: the evacuation of the wounded, the management of 
tlie trains, the loading of the projectiles, the entraining of the 
troops, the administrative posts of the coinmissaries, all positions 
which could be occupied, with better success perhaps, by people 
^vithoat any military training. Even the chief of train of the 
Commander-in-chief, a post which might have been given to a 
lieutenant of the reserve, was occupied by a lieutenant-colonel 
of the General Staff. This took place when there was a lack of 
officers of the General Staff for purely military purposes, as, for 
example, the officers of the General Staff' would have been far 
more useful and in tlieir place in reconnoitering service. In gen- 
eral, in the present war the entire management of all branches 
of the service was in the hands of officers of the General Staff, 
a,nd for this reason they are responsible for all the results. 

The character of the Commander-in-chief was clearly shown 
in all his actions. His irresolution, going hand in hand with ab- 
solutism and the distaste of listening to good advice, accommo- 
dated itself to the system adopted by him, that of passive resist- 
ance and the weakening of the enemy during the retreat. But 
this sj^stem was not approved of either by Eussia or by the 
Army, and with each new retreat discontent grew, this discontent 
forcing Ivuropiatkin to desist from the plan adopted by him and 
corresponding best to his character — and he suffered a fiasco. 
When the Army was entrusted to a man, it was wrong to ignore 
Siis character, which could not be altered according to desire. For 
this reason he ought not to have been interfered with. If later on 
it was admitted that his system could not bring about the desired 
]'esults, it would have been necessary to replace him by some 
other man. But, leaving him at his post, it was wrong to make 
him deviate from the plan he had elaborated beforehand. 

General Kuropatkin is not an old man, is very hardwork- 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. IQQ 

ing, and distinguishes himself by great activity^, while in real- 
ity the scope of the Commander-in-chief is rather limited, as it 
consists, mainl}^, in general management, in direotion without 
any active part in the real command of the troops. Such activ- 
ity did not satisfy the lively natnre of General Kuropatkin and 
he went beyond these limits, sometimes leading independent oper- 
ations in person. Such meddling, if the word may be used, in 
the affairs entering into the exclusive competency of the Army 
commanders, had its very negative sides; moreover, it deflected 
the attention of the Commander-in-chief from giving instruc- 
tions as to the general command. 

The command of an independent army, consisting in the 
direct management of the troops, is better suited to the charac- 
ter of tlie former Commander-in-chief. 

As soon as there arose indications as to the concentration of 
large hostile forces, accompanied by little information, the sen- 
sitive Commander-in-chief became nervous and shifted his troops 
without any real necessity. I have already observed how much 
hann arose from such mixing up, (the frequent occurrence of 
which only increased the evil and often influenced unfavorably 
the course oil the battles. 

The chiefs, in such eases, commanded troops which they did 
not know — the peculiar capacities, the endurance, the character 
of these strange units were unknown to them. This undermined 
the compactness, the integrity, the wholeness of the Army, which 
in all armies is obtained with so much difficulty. 

Grippenberg's departure and rumors as td his return were ex- 
plained by distrust felt in SU Petersburg towards General Kuro- 
patkin and to the system of constant retreat adopted by him. This 
undermined greatly the prestige of the Commander-in-chief at 
the time when on the theater of war arose the most critical, most 
serious moments, in which the faith in the higher commander 
ought to be strongest. It seem? to me that tlie enemy could not 
have chosen a better time to give us a decisive blow, The Japan- 



j^jQ THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

ese are excellent psychologists ; they understood well the feeling of 
our Army, its distrust of the Ccmmander-in-cliief, and^ as it may 
be seen, weighed all this before deciding upon their risky opera- 
tions near Mukden. 

Technique, so far as application of various technical means 
is concerned, stands lower in our Army than in the Japanese. 
They make use of all the modern improvements for the organiza- 
tion of the defense as well as of the attack. Tlic principal thing 
is their having a great nam]>cr of machine guns. They had 
appreciated already hefoi'c the war the value of this dreadful 
weapon. There is no doubt that machine guns play an ini port- 
ant role, especially in the defense — one machine gun l)eing equal 
to a company of soldiers. AV'e did not give due attention to tliis 
deadly arm in the beginning of the war. Even later on, after 
luniiig experieuced on ourselves all its iuiportance, we did not 
iiitjoduce it energetically enough into our Army; uji to this time 
the number of machine guns is much smaller in our Army tlian 
n\ that of the enemy. 

I have already described in tlie begiiming how our troops 
were brought from Russia to the theater of war, and how, on 
the road, on account of the imperfect organization of the trans- 
portation of troops, the discipline of the men was not at the 
necessary height. Why should not. these troops have been formed, 
while still in Russia, before their sending off, into temporary units 
(companies, for example), with non-commissioned officers and offi- 
cers in active service, though tliese might be in numbens below 
the normal status (they migiit return after having' taken the 
men to their respective detachments). Before their sending of! 
to the seat of war these temporary units might undergo military 
training for a week or two, go over the military regulations a.nd 
get acquainted with the new^ arms (there were such who, imme- 
diately upon their arrival, went into iDattle without having learnt 
how to handle our new rapid-fire rifle), restore their already, for- 
gotten military spirit, remind them of their soldiers' profession 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. m 

and of the difficult task lying befoTe tliem upon their reaching 
their destination. On the road military drill could likewise take 
place during the halts, a thing which would greatly benefit the 
men passing long hours without moving in the close atmosphere 
of the cars. Under such conditions no disorders would arise, no 
slackening of discipline, the troops would reach their destina- 
tion fully prepared for their difficult duties, and, what is most 
important, the contaminating microbe of insubordination and 
violation of discipline would ]iot have penetrated to the seat 
of war. 

The older the soldier, the more disaccustomed has he grown 
to military work, tlie less he is acquainted with the new regula- 
tions and the new arms, and, what is the most important, the less 
mobile he is. In wars like the present, waged far from the mother 
country, the sending of older reserve soldiers ought to be avoided, 
as long, of course, as there is no actual need to do so ; it must be 
limited to the younger men. It seems to me that in the actual war 
Russia was not forced to mobilize her entire reserve, and it would 
have been more to the point to mobilize all the districts instead 
of only certain ones, and to call to the colors only the youngest 
reservists. In that way, not only would the troops have been 
formed of the best material, but justice would have been main- 
tained Avith regard to the population, for under those conditions 
all Eussia would have paid her tribute to the war, as far as the 
taking part of her population is concerned, while under the sys- 
tem adopted some districts gave their entire forces and others 
gave almost nothing at all. 

There is one more cause of enmity between the officers of the 
Staif and those serving with the colors. The Staff officers easily 
obtain all kinds of decorations, while those serving in the line 
are rewarded for^actual bravery with great difficulty. The Stalf 
officers all have decorations, while among the officers of the line 
there are not a few wounded ones who have returned to their reg- 
iments even without the so-called ^"'cranberry" (Anna decoration 



112 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 



K>1 the fourth class). I remember how^ bel'orel the departure of 
General Kuroptakin, all the officers of the Staff rushed to get 
decorations. Several hundreds were distributed. It was dis- 
'agreeable to listen to their disputes as to whO' was entitled to 
which particular decoration. All^ even those who, as we say, 
^liadn^t smelt powder/' wanted orders with the swords for brav- 
er}^ It is very peculiar that not one of these intrepid Staff offi- 
cers had been wounded throughout the entire campaign. 

I am again referring to the Mukden operaitions. According 
to my opinion, as I have already stated, our failure at Mukden 
must be attributed, principally, to the circumstance that the 
Second Army passed two days in inactivity, giving the Japanese 
the opportunity to (concentrate their forces. It is very probable 
that thanks 'to this circumstance the enemy decided to transfer 
'his principal operations and strike a decisive blow against our 
right flank, ignoring our remaining positions. As far as I know, 
this delay in the operations can not be laid at the door of the 
Commander-in-chief, for in the beginning of the Mukden affair, 
•temembering the still fresh incident with General Grippenberg, 
he limited himself to giving general directions. Later on, see- 
ing our failure, he again took the active direction into his hands. 
Here again we recognize General Kuropatkin's character. If he 
considered his system as the best adapted to the existing circum- 
stances, he ought not to have been confused by any reception 
given in St. Petersburg to any general, be he friend or foe, and 
sc much the more at such a critical moment, when the change 
of a system which had reigned throughout the entire campaign, 
could evolve only negative results. 

The final success of the Japanese at Mukden was not due 
Ito the fighting or numerical superiority of their army, or their 
yfekillful plan of operations, but to their knowledge of our Com- 
mander-in-chiefs psychology. They had studied carefully his 
plan of campajign, the character of his operations, his mode of 
fighting and made allowances for his state of mind alt the time 



TEE TRUTE ABOUT TEE ^VAR. H^ 

Ibeing. If we carefully consideT the Japanese operations at Muk- 
den, we can not find a single factor of a signal victory gained 
by fighting. In reality they could not, in spite of 'their technical 
and numerical superiority, take a single one of our more important 
positions near Mukden. 'Not a single remarkable movement can 
likewise be designated. They had but one important advantage 
on their side — ease of movement. Thus their understanding of the 
Commander-in-chief'''s psychology was the principal cause of 
their success. It allowed them to strike a decisive blow, sure of 
its success, in spite of the risky maneuvers and operations. It was 
they who led us, who forced us to do what they wanted. We 
obeyed their initiative as if hypnotized. Follow closely the Muk- 
den fights. The Japanese concentrated their forces at a certain 
point, or made believe that they concentrated them. Instead of 
endeavoring to make a counter-maneuver, we rushed towards 
them and shifted our troops from one front to the other. The 
Japanese changed the direction of their movements — wo followed 
them. All their efi^orts under Mukden to win by desperate at- 
tacks broke against our stubborn opposition. Meeting Avith fail- 
ure in affairs where skill does not play a prominent role, where 
true courage and steadfastness are the winning elements, the 
Japanese moved on towards the north and dragged us along after 
themi. If we had attacked his positions at the time when the 
enemy was extending his front, seemingly endeavoring to turn us, 
but in reality enticing us after him, it is possible that we might 
have' succeeded in breaking through his lines and frustrating all 
his plans by a skillful maneuver, forcing him to take up another 
position than the one that was advantageous to him. When we 
had extended our front to such a degree that we could no more 
follow the enemy^s movements, the Commander-in-chief decided 
to retreat— t. e., to escape from under the influence of the enemy 
at the time when the success of the Japanese was coming to an 
end. I derive it from the fact that during the retreat our posi- 
tion near Mukden was dangerous. A narrow passageway was 



H^^ THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

formed, fired at by the enemy from east and west. Our troops 
retreated by this passage, with tlie exception of General Linevich's 
army, which was retreating independently of the other troops. 
Both flanks of the enemy advanced some 10 versts more to the 
north than onr rear guard. This rear guard, under command of 
Greneral Myloff, was very insignificant, consisting in all of somd 
25 battalions with. limited contingents, each numbering not over 
500 men. The Japanese could easily lia^e achieved a junction 
at any point, and thus cut off our way of retreat, destroying our 
rear guard. How did it result? This handful of intrepid men, 
as compared to the forces of the enemy, skillfully commanded, 
surrounded in reality, keeps off the entire Japanese Army, and 
we succeed in calmly marching off with our troop.-, our train, and 
our artillery. Some 35 to 40 guns, and part of the train, which 
fell into the hands of the enemy, were abandoned by us through 
carelessness and negligence. Here, again, the Japanese did not 
take advantage of their victory to Tout us entirely and place us 
in the necessity to end the war on conditions dictated by them. 
This time, again, they allowed our Army to escape, giving it the 
opportunity to grow strong anew and become, as heretofore, capa- 
ble of fighting, their losses being not less than ours, Avhile the 
iiisoTganization and fatigue of their troops were so great that 
they had become incapable of pursuing further their victorious ad- 
vance. Where do you see, let me ask, the skill and remarkable 
tactics of the Japanese military commanders? I am confident 
that had we been in the place of the Japanese — i. e.^ w^ere our roles 
inverted in the Mukden afi'air, nothing would have remained from 
the Japanese Army, in spite of all our shoi^tcomings. 

Generally speaking, I failed to notice these marvels, these 
wonderful qualities of the Japanese, about which such legendary 
tales were being spread. They are fables, disseminated by those 
to whom they were needed, wdiile we took them up blindly and 
repeated them like parrots. We were told of the astounding 
bravery of the Japanese; that neither their oflicers nor their sol- 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 115 

diers knew what retreat was; that they shot themselves or per- 
formed the liamkiri rather than to allow themselves to be taken 
prisoners, and when captured they smashed their heads against 
the walls. I have seen nothing of the kind. It may be that some 
intellectually abnormal or over-enthusiastic officer kas taken his 
life, but this is an exceptional fact, which was likewise observed 
in our Army. There were likewise some among us who sent bul- 
lets through their brains when left wounded on the field of battle, 
not desiring to fall into the hands of the enemy. But I myself 
was a witness how Japanese officers, I do not mention the soldiers, 
fell on their laiees and raised their hands, begging for mercy. I 
saw their flights, saw how their troops met the fleeing with fire 
so as to keep them from retreating, and how, in spite of this, they 
were unable to arrest their flight. We were also told that the 
Japanese had excellent topographical mape, far superior to ours. 
This was not so. They had got possession of our maps, made 
Japanese inscriptions above the Eassian ones, and photographed 
them. These were the maps they used. I do not wish to dimin- 
ish their good qualities. The Japanese Army presents a compact, 
united whole, animated by a common spirit; the Japanese are 
stubborn, and intrepid lighters, but they are men like others. 
■There is nothing superhuman in them, nothing of what has been 
sung in their praise. As 1 have already said, they are penetrated 
with the consciousness and understanding of the purpose of the 
war. These qualities were lacking in our troops. But has any 
one taken the trouble of explaining to them the importance of 
the present war to our country, and what benefit would be derived 
from its victorious ending? They were only told to "go and shed 
their blood for the Czar and the country.'^ It is true that this 
is beautiful, this means already a great deal. But in the present 
century, when, in spite of the low intellectual standard of the 
people, the lower classes begin to consider the present conditions 
critically, this is not yet all that is necessary for conscious in- 
spiration, indispensable to gain victory over the enemy, especially 



-j^-^g THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

an enemy like the Japanese, possessing more perfect military 
technique. Even now, after our defeat at Mukden, when the 
continuance of war until its victorious ending has become still 
more necessary to us, when the aim has grown more clearly de- 
fined, no one deems it necessary to explain all this to the troops, 
to tell them what they are shedding their blood for, what that 
victory is needed for. Tell them, lastly, that this victory is needed 
by us to re-establish our prestige as a great, powerful nation, to 
maintain our territory in the Far Easit and guard it from the 
/encroachment of the Japanese, who after having gained a strong 
l/ foothold in Korea and Manchuria, may take it from us when- 
ever they please, and becoming, in case of our defeat, absolutely 
invulnerable as far as we were concerned. Last of all, it is impos- 
sible to throw to the winds hundreds of millions of the nation^s 
savings, expended for the construction of the railways and the 
creation of cities in Manchuria. The liussian people will die, 
but will never surrender their Saratoff, Tamboff, Tomsk, or Irk- 
utsk. Why should Kharbin, created lilvc these with our flesh 
and blood, be less dear to us? Tell them all this, and you will 
see that they will be: penetrated with the consciouis understanding 
of the aim and its attaimnent, and that they will lead us to vic- 
tory like their fathers and grandfathers. And then the soul of 
the man, loving Eussia and the Russians, will not be racked by 
the pitying words pronounced by our friends for our consolation, 
so to say. These paroles de condoUance are far worse than the 
laughter of malicious joy that is heard in the camp of our ene- 
mies at each of our failures. 

I have frequently heard the opinion that d(ifeat would make 
us wise and force us to correct all the mistakes of our life, after 
which the economical conditions of Russia woaild soon improve 
and we would soon replace the losses suffered through this unfor- 
tunate war. France after the disaster of 1870 is pointed out as 
an example. But it seems to me that, in order to develop econom- 
ically, it is necessary to be politacally strong, it is needful to be 



TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 117 

able to parry the, blows coming from without, for there is not 
a nation in existence that would be sincerely glad of our prog- 
ress, with the execption, maybe, of the Slavs. All are in fear of 
our power, and, everyone understands that economical progress 
would only increase our strength and would render us uncon- 
querable indeed. Therefore, as soon as our economic progress 
will begin to give young, healthy shoots, liable to grow into a 
magnificent plant, our enemies, taking advantage of our polit- 
ical weakness, will again striker a blow against us^ destroying the 
results of our dawning prosperity, and we will again return to 
I he former condition, remaining some ten years behind universal 
culture. 

Our victory over the Japanese would reestablish our pres- 
tige and give us back the respect and glamor we have lost. The 
France of 1870 can not serve as an example to us. The condi- 
tions were different; her downfall and the rise of Germany was 
of no interest to anybody, and this paralyzed the desire of Ger- 
many, who some ten years later was again desirous of striking 
a still more forceful blow, fearing her economic progress. Our 
conditions are not the same.- There is no country to whom our 
progress might be useful. No one will take our part; everyone, 
on the contrary, will endeavor to weaken our strength and power. 
All our hope is centered in ourselves, and if there i^ any one smil- 
ing at us, it is only for the purpose of deriving some direct or in- 
direct profit. We must conquer, and we can conquer if we get pene- 
trated with the consciousness of our vietory^s necessity, and if 
we succeed in inspiring our troops with this consciousness. 

It is said that it is necessary to make peace. Very well, 
let us consider the demands of Japan as the conqueror : 

(1) The evacuation of the whole of Manchuria; (2) The 
cession of Sakhalin; (3) The disarmament of Vladivostok and 
the condition of having no fleet a,t this point; (4) Political 
power over Korea; (5) The keeping of Port Arthur; (6) An 
indemnity of, let us say, 1,000,000,000 roubles. 



^-j^g THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

We would thus lose our railway as far as V^ladivostok, and 
we would) have to build another branch from Sretensk to Vladi- 
vostok and again expend over 250,000,000 roubles. Our supremacy 
in the Pacific Ocean would be brought down to zero, and our 
distant boundary would be left to fate and to Japan. The pay- 
ment of 1,000,000,000 roubles would be the equivalent of a bur- 
den of 100,000,000 roubles l^eing placed on our budget, at a time 
when they are most needed for the development of culture, and 
there are no two opinions as to its being necessary. And all this 
independently of the cession of Sakhalin^ the humiliation of 
national dignity and self-love from the: loss of prestige and of hun- 
dreds of millions expended on the construction of the- Chinese 
Eailway and cities. 

'No, you may sa}' what you wish, but I do not believe that a 
true citizen of the Eussian Empire would consent at present to 
all this when far from all the resources have been exhausted for 
the turning of the war into a new phase more favorable to us. 

I might understand the following compromise: Let Japan 
govern Korea de facto j let us withdraw our troops from Man- 
churia, keeping the concession of the railway; let the Japanese 
have even Port Arthur and the Chinese Eailway have Dalny as 
its terminus. But Japan, intoxicated with her triumphs, would 
not accept even such conditions. 

I am more than convinced that should the Zemski Sober (or 
whatever that assembly might be named) be convened to-morrow, 
it would surely resolve to continue the war straining all efforts 
to do so. 



Chapter XVII. 

THE FIEING. 

A mass of projectiles and bullets are fired uselessly by the 
artillery and the infantry, and therefore after each big battle the 
j\rn]y remains without any kind of ammunition. The same may 
be noticed among the Japanese. They shoot often without any 
reason and without need. 

It is said that the artillery causes great losses. Frankly 
speaking, I did not notice this in the ^lukden fights. It is true 
that I could see only the efi'ecc of the Japanese artillery. I do 
not know^ how ours worked; I know only that the Japanese guns 
caused very insignificant losses to us. I do not believe that more 
than 2 per cent of all losses in killed and wounded fell to the 
share of the artillery. It is true that many and frequent shots 
were fired, and everywhere the roar of the artillery was heard, 
everyhere flew shrapnel and s himosas, but they were all fired 
mto space, without causing any damage. 

In Manchuria, on broken terrain, covered with many hills, 
the artillery fires from behind these heights. The area of the 
hill in rear of which it is supposed that the artillety has taken up 
its position being small, it is not difficult to shower projectiles 
upon it and reach the artillery. It is easier to observe here the 
effect of the projectiles. Even here it is not always possible to 
determine in rear of which hill the artillery is posted. But in a 
plain like that, for example, wliere Mukden is situated, where the 
villages are close to each other and surrounded by clay walls and 
planted with trees, nothing can be seen at a distaaice of two hun- 
dred sajens. Yet there are many gullies and folds in the ground 
from which artillery can operate remaining absolutely invisible 

119 



120 TEE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

to the enemy. Try to find it; it is impossible to shower pro- 
jectiles over*an area of several scores of square; miles. 

The artillery, in general, adapted itself very rapidly to the 
technique of ar^tilkry combat and quickly grew used to the char- 
'acter of the locality, taking advantage of its topogTa;phical feat- 
ures. The Japanese artillery, as far as the guns are concerned, is 
inferior to ours. Our field gun can fire 8 shots per minute, while 
the Japanese can fire only from 4 to 5 shots. But they manage 
better than we do all-around fire over a certain area which is the 
only effective one. They maintain their batteries in better touch 
and often several batteries of various units operate in joint action 
against the same area. Our artillery Imows nothing of such 
joint action. 

Our artillery has one general projectile — the shrapnel, which 
explodes, according to desire, either at a certain distance or by 
concussion. The Japanese have a system of loading in wliich 
the cartridge is separate frojn the projectile, and this decreases thi' 
rapidity of their fire. They have two kinds of projectiles: shrap- 
nel, bursting at a determined distance, and the shimosas (gren- 
ades), bursting by concussion. There is no doubt that there is 
greater al vantage in having only one kind of projectiles — there 
being no confusion, met with when firing with two different 
kinds, because it may often happen that when it would be nec- 
essary to fire shrapnel, grenades are at hand, and vice versa. This 
was often noticed in the Japanese Army. However, in the pres- 
ent war, in which Ihe numerous Chinese villages, surrounded by 
clay walls, play the role of fortified points, firing with grenades 
with the aim of destroying these fortifications is of great im- 
portance, shrapnel being absolutely useless for this purpose. The 
grenade in other cases is of little advantage, the only effect pro- 
duced being solely a moral one. The sound made by it when fly- 
ing and bursting is exceedingly disagreeable and acts very badly 
upon the nerves. However, with time the nerves are bluD^ed and 
its influence becomes almost unnoticeable. 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 121 

Large-caliber guns are indispensable for the damaging of 
f ortilications, but it is very difficult to take them along and use 
them with the field artilleTy. Fine roads are necessary first of 
all. The Japanese could take advantage of these only during 
winter. Moreover, one must be sure of victory, as they hamper 
greatly the retreat, not to say that in such a case it is quite im- 
possible to carry them away. 1 think that the artillery which is 
placed in position would be more useful if it remained there until 
the last moment during the attack, causing great losses to the 
enemy by its fire, even though it be necessary to abandon the 
guns afterwards in retreating. 

Our field mortars, having a maximum range of 3 versts, are 
of little use, as at so short a distance from the enemy it is diffi- 
cult to render them invisible and they risk being fired at and 
destroyed. 

According to my opinion, rifle fire is often indulged in with- 
out deriving any advantage whatever from it. It is of little 
efl'ect at long range, especially in thickly inhabited localities, where 
it is difiicult to distinguish anything, even at short distances, on 
account of tlie mass of villages covering them. It seems to me 
that the soldiers ought to be kept from firing at long range- 
thus developing stolidity and coolness in them. 

To illustrate long-range firing, I will mention the following 
.incident: 

The white smoke of bursting shra.pnel was seen here and 
(here on the horizon. I asked the officer detailed to the general 
conducting the coiribat : 

"This smoke seen there on the horizon, is this the enemy's 

shrapnel ?" 

"Yes ; our positions are there.^' 

I started for that point. I passed a redoubt occupied by our 
troops. Our battery was firing in rear of me and the projectiles 
flew over my head. The whistling sound produced by them 
was more disagreeable than that of the enemy's shrapnel bursting 



122 ^^^ TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

around me. This uncanny feeling was' increased by the fact that 
there were cases when the shraipnel burst prematurely. I began 
to wonder what it meant. Our positions were far away, while the 
artillery was here. But, as nothing was said to me when I passed 
our redoubt, I proceeded further. Suddenly I heard the patter 
of bullets to one side of me; 1 looked, and saw our advanced line 
of sharpshooters. I dismounted and approached one of the sol- 
diers, who was firing m kneeling position. I knelt beside him 
and gazed in the direction of his aim, but, in spite of all my efforts, 
I saw nothing. At last I asked the soldier : 

"A^Tiat are you firing at?" 

^^There, at the Japanese.'^ 

^'"Where are- they ? I do not see them.' ' 

"There, there.''' 

"Do you see them ?" 

"Not by any means." 

"Why do you fire, then ?" 

"Just so, it makes you feel gayer." 

It came out that at the point wherQ the shrapnel was burn- 
ing were Japanese positions, and not ours, while the bursting 
shrapnel was that fired by the batteiy shooting over my head 
when I passed. 



Chapter XYIII. 

THE CONSEQUEXCES OF THE SURKEXDEK OF POET 
• ARTHUR. 

Speaking of artillery firing, I can not help mentioning tlie 
surrender of Port Arthur, which I can by no means get out of 
mj mind, not so much the very fact of its surrender— for there 
is no fortress that could hold out forever^ — as the mode of sur- 
render — i. e., the conditions on which the capitulation was made 
and all that General Stoessel found necessary to accept and puncl- 
ually execute. I shall not discuss the possibility of Port Arthur 
holding out still longer, although I had the occasion to talk witli 
many of the defenders of the fortress who maintained that there 
w^as no imperative need of surrender at the time. The conditions 
of the capitulation were such as are accepted when the enemy 
enters a fortress by force, and not when it is willfully surren- 
dered, and there was no necessity of agreeing to abandon to the 
enemy all the guns, projectiles, and other matevid of war in all 
their integrity. What would the Japanese have done to the de- 
fenders of Port Arthur had they taken it by storm, and not entered 
it on the conditions of the capitulation? Nothing, except lay- 
ing down the same conditions as those accepted by General Stoes- 
sel; but then all the guns might have been exploded or submerged, 
as well as all the projectiles, They might not have freed Gen- 
eral Stoessel and the other officers who returned to Russia with 
him. But no dishonor would have fallen upon them, and neit!. i 
Russia nor the Army would have suffered from it. But the sni- 
render of the guns and projectiles to the enemy wrought a great 
deal of harm to our troops. I cannot forget the horror which 
took possession of me at Mukden, near the Imperial Tombs, when 

123 



124 THE TRUTH ABOUT TEE WAR. 

a shrapnel burst close to me. I saw oil the fuse which I picked 
up the letter T and Arabic figures. An officer who happened to 
be with me explained to me that this was our shrapnel. The 
shots did not cease^ and in our terror we thought that our own 
battery was firing at us. But a colonel of the G-eneral Staff, who 
arrived at that moment, explained to us that opposite to us were 
drawn up the Port Arthur troops and they were firing against our 
men with our own guns and our own projectiles. Here are 
the results of the capitulation, thanks to which Eussia had the 
pleasure of seeing a few months earlier the hero of Port Arthur 
and his wife and to strew with flowers the road over which they 
traveled, in the perfume of which General Stoessel must have 
smelt likewise the reek of the innocent blood of the Russian 
heroes struck down by the guns and with the projectiles which he 
delivered to the enemy, so as to announce quicker to Russia how 
honestly and sacredly he had fulfilled his duty to the Czar and to 
his country. 

I cannot speak coolly about all this — I saw the mutilated bod- 
ies of our soldiers struck down by our own guns, I heard their 
moans and their curses, and my heart sheds tears of blood at the 
very thought of these horrors. 



Chapter XIX. 

THE CAERYmCx OF THE WOUNDED FEOM THE 
FIELD OF BATTLE. 

The carrying of tlie wounded from the field of battle is like- 
wise a very important question. There is no soldier in the world 
who would not, if this could be done without exposing him- 
self to shame and reprimand, leave the ranks during battle. 
This is why we see during battle the wounded led and carried by 
soldiers. It is true that, in addition to the desire of getting away 
from the danger zone for a while, they are likewise prompted by 
a feeling of humanity; his comrade is moaning and losing blood, 
how were it possible to let him lie? But as one wounded is 
mostly carried by four men, we can easily imagine how thin the 
ranks would grow if the soldiers were allowed to carry off the 
wounded. The officers forbid it as far as they can, but they too are 
men and their comrades fall at their sides; and if permission 
is given to take up an officer, the same permission must be given 
for the soldier, and the result is that all the wounded are thus 
carried from the field. More than once on this account success 
did not crown our arms. 

It would be cruelty to demand that the wounded be left un- 
til the end of the battle or the advent of night ; but however cruel 
be such a request, if no other solution can be found to this ques- 
tion, we must insist on it, for humaneness, displayed in such a 
"way, brings great harm, carrying in its wake the destruction 
of entire units, of thousands of men. 

It seems to me, however, that there is a solution, if not an 
entirely satisfactory one, one at least diminishing the harm en- 
duing from the soldiers' exit from the ranks for the purpose of 

125 



126 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE MAR. 

picking up the wounded. Why should not our charitable societies, 
which have sent so many well-organized detachments to the front 
for the assistance of our wounded warriors^ create special units 
of carriers for the purpo'se of picking up the woimded and carry- 
ing them from the field of battle. The society or institution which 
would do this would in reality do a great deal of good. It would 
not only ease the sufferings of the wounded by having them taken 
up more quickly, but would free from such duty soldiers, whose 
principal aim is lighting, thus keeping them in the ranlcs for 
battle, in w^hich every man is of value. During lull in military 
operations these carriers might be employed for other useful 
Avork. This is easily found on the theater of war. 

It seems to me that this matter ought to be considered. 
Something might, perhaps, be done in that direction. 

As a rule, assistance is indispensable to the wounded on the 
very field of battle. It is badly organized in our Army.. Each 
soldier has his individual emergency package, but not every one 
of them knows how to use it, and there are wounded who 
would not be able to dress their wounds themselves. There ought 
to be a greater number of flying detachments which should give 
first aid to the woanded on the field of battle, then it would not 
be so necessary for some of the wounded to be immediately 
evacuated. 



Chapter XX. 



THE KIISSIAN SOLDIER. 



Before closing this essay^ I must say a few words about our 
soldier. 

Our soldier is very enduring; he is accustomed to all kind 
of privationS;, and bears them with resignation and without a 
murmur. I will not say that he is endowed with that dashing, 
reckless bravery with which people generally associate the Rus- 
sian soldier. Ke goes forward because it must be sO', but exalta- 
tion is not developed in him. He is not used to independence, 
his initiative is limited, he is not sufficiently observative and ori- 
ents himself badly; I had more than once occasion to observe 
that he remembers but imperfectly the roads by which he trav- 
eled and the villages in which he has been (the Cossacks are an 
exception; they orient themselves very well). This is not because 
he is lacking in innate qualities and capacities; he has been ren- 
dered such by his military education, the drill e7i masse, without 
any independent problems, without any necessary training dur- 
ing maneuvers for the purpose of his being able to orient him- 
iSelf in an unknown locality. The soldier in battle is steadfast 
in the repulse of attacks and intrepid in attack as long as he has 
a leader possessing the same qualities and as long as he is with 
him; but as soon as the commander leaves the ranks, the sol- 
diers feel lost like chickens without their mother hen. I had 
occasion to ol)serve myself how bravely a company' went into the 
fire as long as all the officers had not been put liors de combat; 
but after the loss of their last officer the soldiers grew confused, 
not knowing what to do, and had not the commander of a neigh- 
l)oring company come to their assistance ])y sending one of his 

127 



-j^23 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

officers^ the company would have retreated. It seems to me that, 
taking into consideration this peculiarity of our soldier, there 
ought to be in each regiment some reserve oiticers who should, in 
case of the loss of all the officers of a company, replace these. 
(This only for the present war, for it must be hoped that for 
future wars our soldier will be different.) The commander of 
one company cannot always know what is taking place in the 
neighboring units, and, moreover, he may not have any officers 
to spare. This is of great importance, considering the enormous 
loss among the officers which takes place in the present war. 

The Russian soldier is more than any other penetrated with 
love, kindness, and thoughtfulness. If he love his officer, his care 
for him knows no bounds ; he becomes his most tender nurse. He 
does everything in his power to lighten his life in the field; he 
(endeavors to find him a safe place in battle, risking his own life 
while looking for such a point. 

His kindheartedness is most conspicuous in his treatment of 
the prisoners. A Japanese prisoner becomes the guest of the 
Russian soldiers. They slap his shoulder, pronounce a few words, 
endeavoring to make him understand that he is safe among them. 
We often see scenes like the following and which are most touch- 
ing: A Japanese is sitting down; by his side is a Russian sol- 
dier. They converse and seem to understand each other. How 
they manage this 1 really do not know. Now the Russian sol- 
dier gets a lump of sugar and with a kindly smile, as if saying 
that he would like to treat him with something better, he presses 
it upon the Japanese. The Japanese tries to thank him the best 
he can for the tidbit. Taking from out of his uniform a white 
cake, he presents it to the soldier. The latter breaks off a small 
piece and gives back the rest, trying to explain that the Japanese, 
who is not accustomed to our brown bread, will need it himself. 
And both laugh in a kindly way. It is ditlicult to realize that 
these men rushed fiercely against each other some half-hour ago. 
I do not know how our men live in Japan, but the Japanese can- 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE ^yAR. - 129 

not complain of the treatment received by their prisoners at our 
hands. 

The soldier is assured that a soldier's profession is one of 
the most honorable ones^ but he does not see this : he is not treat- 
ed as a man pursuing a high profession. Should more consider- 
ation be manifested toward the soldier by the authorities and the 
public not only in time of war^ but also in time of peace, the 
morale of our troops would be far higher. 

What a difference between our system of discipline and the 
Japanese. The Japanese discipline is more strict than ours in 
principle, while in form it is more humane. It does not lower 
human dignity or the honorable calling of the soldier. A private 
inay, in the presence of the officer, smoke, drink, and be present 
in all public institutions. Being in the same places as liis offi- 
cer, he learns to behave everywhere equally correctly, thus acquir- 
ing the esteem of tlte entire populaition. In our Army it is quite 
the opposite. In the presence of an officer the soldier has no right 
to smoke, nor to be at any public place, while if, as has been 
said already, he had the possibility of going to various public in- 
stitutions where his officer goes, he would acquire a certain tact in 
his relations not only to his officers, but everybody in general; a 
thing which would influence the general course of his life and 
raise the standard of his moral and human dignity. At present, 
unfortunately, the soldier is not always correct in various public 
institutions, and, on the other baud, our relations to the soldier 
lower his human and soldierly dignity. Is not the ccntemptuous 
^'thou" with which, according to regulations, the officer addresses 
the soldier, even the one who has received a high education or 
wears a high military decoration — the St. Cleorge, an insult to 
the '^onoral)le calling of the soldier*? We must ajjandon in 
this case likewise the obsolete form, and adapt ourselves to the 
demands exacted by the new conditions of life. 

I cannot lielp remarking that the defense of the traditional 
^•thou" in addressing the soldier, as met in military literature, can 



130 



Tin-: TltLTIi AHOVT THE ^VAli. 



Dot be considered in any way suflicieJit, as it is diKtirxguislied by 
great insincerity and naive sophisms. The military calling is in 
truth an honoral)le one^ and this honor ought to be evidenced 
everywhere down Lo the lowest ranks of military hierarchy. All 
deviations from this rule, arising from ancient customs which 
took 1)irtli in times of serfdom, have long lost all right to exist- 
ence and are in direct contradiction to the new conditions of Army 
life and the national solf-consciousness asserting itself so vividly. 

In Japan the soldier's calling is truly honorable and the 
troops are respected l)y the entire population. I will mention a 
very characteristic though maybe somewJiat misplaced fact, told 
me by a lieutenant of our fleet: 

^'^A young and very pretty flower-girl, named Ishine-Musme, 
brought us beautiful chrysanthemums every morning. She at- 
tracted me greatly, and I wished to make a closer acquaintance 
with her. For this purpose I had recourse to an old woman of great 
skill in persuasion, whose elocjuence few could withstand. She 
never stopped at anything, there was no woman she would not 
approach. When I asked her to make me; acquainted with little 
Ishine^Musme, she answered rudely: ^N'o, no; I can^t do it.' 
^How so?' I asked with astonishment. ^Why not?' ^She is 
a soldier's friend ; that is why I cannot speak to her about it.' " 

This old woman, who would try to persuade the daughter of 
a high official, without any qualms of conscience, did not wish to 
harm a soldier, a defend^er of her country. 

Two armies stand opposite each other in this war. The one 
is conscious of its dignity and its citizen's duty toward its coun- 
try, understanding its aim and purpose. Each Japanese soldier 
is conscious that in case of victory over the enemy, whose mili- 
tary strength appalled all nations, the glory of his people would 
be great, and Eussia, Avho hindered Japan from reaping the bene- 
fits of her victory over China, will be punished accordingly. He 
(knows tliat his country would acquire Sakhalin with its fisheries, 
so necessary to the Japanese population : Korea with its vast fer- 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. ^ 131 

tile area which would come under full control of Japanese emi- 
grants, the dream of their forefathers; that the commerce of 
Japan would develop extraordinarily, and that all this would. en- 
hance the honor and importance of Japan in the eyes of the en- 
tire world, and that it would promote the economic life of the 
country, improving tlie material condition of all her citizens. 

The other is imbued only with the naked formula of disci- 
pline, which has already lost its former meaning, of absolute obe- 
dience and submission to the will of the chiefs wherever it might 

lead. 

Thus the difference in impulse with which the two armies 
marched against each other is enormous. If we add to this all 
the above-mentioned conditions, we can clearly see how great 
must be the power of the Eussian soldier to be able to hold out 
so long against the Japanese Army in spite of all its advantages. 

Between our oihcer and our soldier there is no other link 
but that of service. All inteilectual communion is lacking; the 
interests of the soldier have nothing in common with the inter- 
ests of the officer, who in tlie eyes ot' the private is a member of 
the privileged class, whieh generally is not looked upon with 
favor by our lower class — the mass of our Army. The lack of 
ordinary citizen's rights increases this estrangement. Everything 
is thug maintained only ])y service relations, by service ties. But 
this link disappears as soon as the soldier leaves the Army and 
returns to his village. Life outside tlie Army gives nothing which 
could alter his view of the privileged classes in general and the 
corps of officers in particular, and it may be easily understood 
that at his return to the ranks the lack of sucli a link is felt still 
more, especially taking into consideration that he comes to a new 
cadre of officers. We observe a diiferent condition of affairs 
among the Japanese. There all the elements of tlie Army are 
closely united by political and national interest^, and this, in addi- 
tion to the strict discipline, renders the Japanese Army a closel}' 
united whole. 



joo THE TRlTll ABOUT THE WAR. 

The Eussian soldieT is im untoiu-hed spring of high innate 
virtues. Raise his standard O't' culture, give the right direetion 
to his thouglit, and the like will not he found in the entire world, 
in spite of his nature lacking martial spirit. 

The reader cannot help asking tlio question: How do the 
soldiers of other nationalities, belonging to oiir Army, behave in 
this w^ar? In answer to this, I must say that T have never dreamt 
of the existence of such unity, such solidarit\- among soldiers of 
different nationalities and religions. They all bear without a 
murmur all the discom-forts of the campaign, are equally brave 
and stolid in the fight. No feud is noticed among them; they all 
live as one friendly family, without paying the slightest atten- 
tion to their differences of nationality and religion. The com- 
mon fate united them and formed them into a conglomerate of 
so solid a composition that races more indigenous by far would 
break against them. The Poles are splendid, intrepid soldiers. 
I accidentally was a witness to the following conversation (I 
cannot say if it was an ofiicer who talked with a soldier or some- 
one else) : 

^"'You tight bravely, boys." 

''We do our best; we try not to he outdone by the others.'^ 

"After all, what are you fighting for? The Russians oppress 
you and give you no rights.'' 

"That is in Russia, that is another matter. Here we are 
soldiers and must fight. A soldier's honor is above all things." 

The Caucasians, Bessarabians (Roumanians), Finns, Ger- 
mans, all behave alilve. 

How great the number of anecdotes on the cowardice of the 
Jews! Yet in the present war many of them have shown them- 
selves to be excellent, braA-e, and intelligent soldiers. Many of 
them have been rewarded by the St. George decoration, some of 
them, have even two and three of these decorations, and these 
crosses have been awarded them by the company, not by the 



TEE TRVTH ABOUT THE WAR. 133 

authorities. And how the other soldiers loved these Jews! The 
oilieers liivewise could not say enough in their praise. 

All these gladsome features show that the Eussian people are 
devoid of national and religious fanaticism, transmitted from 
generation to generation, which admits of no criterion, no reason- 
ing, which hates blindly and unconsciously all that is foreign. 

When all the peoples of the Eussian Empire will enjoy the 
same rights; when all the artificial limitations, at present the 
cause of the existing feud, will have disappeared; when, enjoy- 
ing the same political rights, all will have become equally faith- 
ful citizens — then there will be formed one great Eussian family, 
always ready to rise as one man in the defense of the countr}^, 
for only under such conditions could be secured to all material 
welfare, the main motive principle of the masses, and then only 
will the poHtical power of Iiussia rise to an inaccessible height. 

April 1905. 



RUSSIAN WEIGHTS AND MEASURES. 



Russian Verst, 1. Geographic Mile, 0.144. 

English Statute Mile, 0.663. Degree of Equator, 0.0095.. 

1 verst equals 500 sageus or 3,500 feet; 

3 sagen equals 3 arshins or 7 feet; 

1 arshin equals 16 vershoks or 28 inches; 

1 foot equals 12 inches; 

1 inch equals 10 lines. 



WEIGHTS. 



1 berkovets equals 10 poods; 

1 pood equals 40 Russian pounds or 36 English pounds: 

1 pound equals 32 lots; 

1 lot equals 3 zolotniks; 

1 zolotnik equals 96 dolias. 



COINS. 



1 imperial equals 10 roubles or $5.00; 
] half imperial equals 5 roubles or $2.50; 
1 rouble equals 100 copecks or $0.50; 
1 poltinnik equals 50 copecks or $0.25; 
1 dvugrivenny equals 20 copecks or $0.10; 
1 piatachek equals 5 copecks or $0.02i^. 



l:-5 



INDEX. 



Aghieff, Chief of Section of Chinese Railway 83 

AVexandrovski, Red Cross Plenipotentiary 75 

as administrator 77 

Ak'xieff, General 57 

yilexieff, Viceroy 100 

Artnmonoff, General 63 

his unauthorized retreat to Telin ■. 40 

Artillery, rapidity of fire of Russian and Japanese 120 

Ashitor, village of 12 

Paotaydze, village of 25 

Baoteytsze, village of 13 

Beytaydze 26 

Boikhovitinoff, Colonel 30 

Borisoff, Colonel 35 

occupies Tunchandza 36 

wounded mortally 37 

Burger, General 30 

Camp service, how discharged 103 

Carrying of the wounded from the field of battle 125 

Cause of Japanese success 112 

Cause of Russian failure 98 

Cavalry, Insufficiency of^ — on the theater of war lOi 

Censorship at St. Petersburg 92 

Change of Commander-in-chief 55 

Chief of the Rear, necessity of his being vested wfth immense 

power 97 

Churin, General 28 

Churinoff, to relieve General Myloff 41 

Commander-in-chief, characteristics of 108 

his distrust of his subordinates 105 

Coiisequences of the surrenaer of Port Arthur 123 

Correspondents, criticism of some ..89 

difficulties as regards censorship 88 

party spirit among some 89 

permits to be present at military operations , . . . . 91 

position during war 90 

Dalin Pass, evacuation of 58 

Dariloff, General 57 

Davanganpoo 27, 28 

Departure of General Grippenberg 16 

Detachments for the carrying of_ the wounded from the battle- 
field, establishment advocated'. 1'26 

187 



138 TIIK TRUril ABOUT Tllf^ WAR. 

riary of events ntar Mukclen 25 

February 13th 25 

February 14tli, loth, 16th 25 

February 19th, 20th 29 

February 21st 31 

February 22d 34 

February 23d 35 

February 27th 41 

D:scipline, comparison between Russian and Japanese r29 

Disorders on road, cause of 7 

liistrust, prevalent in Russian Army 93 

Potay, village of 11 

Elf gazooza, village of 29 

Elthaytze, village of 30 

Fankhe River, crossing of 41 

Fanzas, explosives in 13 

Fansintun 29 

Fansytun 31 

Field kitchens, commended 8 

used in railway cars S 

Finnish two-wheel carts for transportation of wounded 78 

Firing 119 

artillei-y TIO 

rifle 121 

Franco-Prussian War, incident during 102 

Fushun, road to — open 58 

Gerngross, General 30,31 

Golembatovski, General 27 

march to Mukden 28 

Gosytun 36 

occupation of 37 

Government control, criticism of 70 

Ciippenberg 102 

departure of — destroys subordination and disseminates dis- 
trust of the commander-in-chief 19 

dire results of departure 16 

effect of departure 109 

ignorance as to Japanese mode of fighting 17 

interviews with newspaper men 17 

Kuropatkin's letter to IS 

unwillingness to remain under command of General Kuro- 

patkin 16 

Gromoff, contractor 68 

Gruber. General Chief Intendant 68 

Qiir>djulin 98 

Hanenfeld. General 30 

Kerschelmann. General 36, 37, 40, 41. 63 

TgPitay .30,31 

Iloo 41 

Imperial Tombs 2^.35 

fight at.. 38 

Russians fired at from guns surrendered at Port Arthur.. ..123 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 139 

In 1 he Army 9 

Iiitendancy 67 

mode of preparing and obtaining supplies 68 

officers 63 

prejudice against 07 

Ivauoff, Captain, act of bravery 38 

J vanoff. General 27,28 

Jctpan, probable demands of 117 

Japanese Army as compared to Russian 130 

commendation of 115 

forces at Mukden operations 62 

Japanese Army, overrated 114 

letreat of 20 

takes offensive 29 

Japanese prisoners, treatment of 128 

Japanese soldiers, status of 131 

Jews, as soldiers, commended 132 

Ivanas ^3 

Kaulbars, General 26, 27, 37, 38, 41 

appointed commander of Second Army 22 

Khandrapoo, village of 2w 

Kbarbin 43 

as principal military ('/f/pf 95 

as rear of the Army 94 

center of railway and administration 8 

testifying to colonizing capabilities of the Russian people. . 8 

Khenitun 36 

Khongoutay, village of 12 

Khoiikha 35,36 

Khorvat, General, builds railway branch to Fushun mines 80 

chief manager of Chinese Railway 79 

praise of 82 

Khunkhe River 26,36 

Japanese attack Third Army at 63 

positions on 59 

settlements on 12 

Khushitay station 37 

Kiousan 37 

Kiuzan, Japanese break through Russian lines at 64 

Kuropatkin, action at Sandepoo 38 

appointed commander of First Army 56 

attitude towards plans of General Gruber 69 

commends Myloff 37 

endeavors to make Grippenberg desist from his resolve to 

depart 18 

letter to Grippenberg of no avail 18 

luxurious railway train of 101 

reprimands General Myloff 36 

surrenders command to General Linevich 55 

system of 107 

Kusantun 36 



140 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

l.adygenski, Colonel, correspondent of "Novoe Vremia" 65 

Lanshanpoo 28, 29 

Liaokhe River, General Mischenko's Army at 11 

lyiiunitz, General 36, 38 

temporarily in command of Second Army 27 

I^inevich, General 26 

discussed 55 

leaves positions near Dalin Pass .. 59 

only general living in /«v*.:f/.s 101 

IJnshinpoo 28 

Losch, Colonel, reinforcements refused to 31 

Lydziavopoo, village of 13 

Machine guns, first time in action 13 

Madiapoo, village of 29,30,35,63 

Malandan-Youoozipoo, 8th Army Corps on line of 13 

Mandarin Road 37,41 

Mandrikin, General, operating on left flank 5.' 

Margarine Sisters 74 

Martoss, General 38 

Masloff, General 57 

Maturan 26 

Mikhaylovski, Engineer Officer 57 

Military Censorship 88 

Military Medical Department, criticised 71 

Mischenko, General, takes command of his troops 41 

wounded 15 

Mortars, Russian field 121 

Mukden 43 

arrival at 9 

as rear of the Russian Army 94 

burning of 85 

cause of failure of Russian arms at 112 

discussion of disaster at 43 

Japanese at 113 

life at 20 

station of 27 

Myloff, General 28, 39, 40, 63 

commended by Kuropatkin 37 

illness of 41 

ordered to protect retreat of Russian Army 37 

reprimanded by Kuropatkin 36 

takes command of Borisoff 's troops 35 

takes offensive 36 

Nodzu, General, idea as to principle of discipline of 10 

Nogi, General 26 

Newsy tun, village of 30,31 

Niedermiiller. General, chief of railway administration 81 

Novgorod Hill ' 58 

Obolesheff, Colonel 51 

Officers, of the Reserve, criticised 96 

Officers, their relations towards the soldiers 131 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 141 

On the road to Mukden " 

Operations at Sandepoo 11 

Disposition of Japanese troops 13 

Disposition of Russian troops 11 

total strength of Russian Army 11 

Operations on left flank and in center 57 

Oukhar-Oronovich, General, in charge of Service of Security and 

Information 21 

Oulinnoo 29, 31 

Padiaza 29, 30, 31, 35 

Panic in the train 45 

Paodaotun 30, Bl, 35 

Peace, undesirability of 118 

Permits, see correspondents 91 

Pestich, Colonel, chief censor 88 

Petereff, General 40 

Petkhoza, village of 26 

Peytkhoza, village of 26 

Poles, attitude Russia and the Army 132 

commended 132 

their view of the soldier's duty 132 

Polivanoff, General, chief censor at St. Petersburg 93 

Port Arthur, premature surrender of 14 

Poutiloff Hill, bombardment of 58 

Preobrajenski, Controller, repairs telegraph line under fire.. .. 35 

Projectiles of Japanese Army 120 

of Russian Army . .120 

Proposed second attack of Sandepoo 19 

Pukhe River 40 

halt at 39 

train attacked near 47 

Puliupoo, village of 30 

Railway and evacuation of Mukden 79 

chief of military transportation of troops 81 

chief of railway administration 81 

chief of the line, tiTing position of 81 

chief of the rear 81 

conflicting orders to personnel 81 

cost of cleaning of refuse from trains de luxe 103 

Decaville Railway 2S 

importance of East-Chinese Railway 79 

one-track railway cause of failure of Russian arms 9S 

Railway personnel, excellent work of 80 

sufferings of 82 

Railway, possibility of constructing more branches for tEe period 

of duration of military operations 98 

scarcity of accidents 80 

the three chiefs of the railway . . 81 

trains with wounded departing from Mukden 85 

unpreparedness for work 79 



142 THD TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

Rear of the Army 94 

a plague of the Army 97 

Reconnaissance, difficulties of 105 

discussed 104 

Red Cross, commendation of 73 

expenditures of 76 

Reinforcements, request for — refused 105 

Rennenkampf, General .. 57 

Reservists, discussed 100 

Russia, apogee of political power how to be attained by 133 

Russian Army, as compared to Japanese 130 

attacks of 1st Siberian Regiment 34 

attitudes of the various nationalities composing 132 

beginning of retreat 37 

esprit and morale of 9 

fatal consequences of two days' inactivity before MuKden.. .. 80 

fight of Zaraysk Regiment 33 

forces in Mukden operations 63 

lack of enthusiasm in 10 

losses of 59 

losses at Salinpoo 27 

losses on February 21st 33 

new disposition for retreat 27 

passive condition of intellectual members of '. . . 9 

positions on February 23d 35 

restoration of order in retreating army 42 

retreat discussed 65 

retreat to left bank of Khunkhe River 36 

sanitary condition of 9 

strength of Second Army at Sandepoo 22 

total strength at Sandepoo 11 

total strength for second attack of Sandepoo 23 

Russian lack of sympathy with operations in the Far East r> 

Russian Staff, its ignorance as to Japanese Army 104 

Russian soldier 127 

characteristics of 127 

kindheartedness of 128 

praise of 132 

self-consciousness to be developed in 116 

status of 131 

Sakharoff, General : 89 

his view on the press 88 

Sakhedza 35 

Sakhepoo 28, 29 

positions at 63 

Salinpoo 29 



THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 143 

Sandepoo, disposition for second attack of. 23 

fortifications of lo 

information received on turning movement of Japanese . . . . 23 

lake in vicinity of 14 

machine guns at l.^» 

Japanese positions at ^ .. 12 

proposed second attack of ly 

Russian losses at 1^ 

turning movement of Japanese reported 21 

Sandiafir, village of 35 

Sanitary condition of Army 71 

Sanitary service 71 

Santaydze, village of 36 

Santayzy station 51 

panic at 52 

Sataydze 36 

Saytadze 35 

station 41 

Sentkhayza, village of 27 

Shakhe River 28 

crossing of 29 

positions on 43 

Shimosas 120 

Short synopsis of Mukden operations 62 

Shrapnel 120 

Shuango, village of 2G 

Siaobiakhe, Japanese reserves at 11 

Siaogoiiza, village of 35 

Siaosooza, village of .. 13 

Siaotuza, occupation of 35 

Sifontay, Mischenko's army at . . . . 11 

Sinmintin, village of .. ..25,30 

Sipingay, village of •. 43 

Sisters of Mercy 73 

Slavuta, addresses engine drivers at Mukden before retreat.. .. 84 

chief of section of Chinese Railway 83 

Soukhoodiapoo 28 

Soumapoo, battle of 12 

Spies, badly organized service of 104 

i^taff officers 107 

enmity of officers of the line towards 107, 111 

Stoessel, General, criticised for surrender of Port Arthur 123 

Strikers, excessive number in Russian Army 103 

Surgeons, lack of on field of battle . . 72 

Takhetun, village of 35,36 

Tashichao 31, 3r, 

fatal issue of battle of 105 

Tasoundiapoo 29 

Tava 37 

train attacked at 46 

Telegraphic information, how forwarded 88 



144 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WAR. 

Telin 29, 40, 41, 43 

as rear of Russian Army 94 

disorders at 42 

road to^ — open 58 

"Thou" criticism of when used in spealiing to soldiers 129 

Tiadousianpoo, Japanese reserves at 11 

Timofeyeff, Colonel, shot by panic-stricken men of train 48 

Tintiantun /. 31 

Tkhenitun 35, 36, 37 

Tolmacheff, General 27 

Topornin, General 30 

Touelpoo 27 

Traffic, impeded by maneuvers of chiefs' trains 102 

Train, attacked on retreat 46 

impediment to movements of troops 99 

start on retreat 46 

Ttans-Baikal Railway 8 

Tsantapoo v ^28 

Tserpitski, General 30 

leads his regiment into fire 32 

Tsiekhanovich, Colonel 30 

Tsuanvanche 31, 35 

Tsuertun 35, 37, 63 

1 synkhenchen detachment 57 

Tunchandza 30 

Two-horse pack stretchers for the carrying of the wounded.. .. 7S 
Yv^'ives of officers, undesirability of their presence at theater of 

military operations 75 

Yansintun 34, 35 

Yasytun 29,30,31 

Youkhuantun * 29, 30, 34, 36, 63 

Youshitay Station 25 

Zapolski, Colonel 30 

Zasulich, repulse® thirteen consecutive attacks 5S 



OCT 9 



